


The Incredible Adventures of Skygirl and the Delinquents

by LaMaupin



Category: The 100 (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Alternate Universe - Superheroes, F/F, Gen, Slow Burn, superhero au
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2016-05-20
Updated: 2016-11-02
Packaged: 2018-06-09 12:40:33
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 9
Words: 35,186
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6907645
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/LaMaupin/pseuds/LaMaupin
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The world knows her as Skygirl, New York's premier superhero, and Clarke wants nothing more than to live up to that.  But with a mysterious new foe on the horizon, can she and her team work with old enemies to save the day? Or will the weight of the past be too much to bear?</p><p>Superhero AU</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> So a general warning up top for violence throughout, although nothing too graphic hopefully. Just like, typical superhero violence (think nothing too much more than you'd see in your typical MCU movie but probably with less property damage and closed head injuries).
> 
> I'll give more specific warnings for things that come up in individual chapters as needed, but I don't foresee there being much of a need for it.
> 
> Many thanks for tumblingforth for beta-ing as always

_Clarke is looking for something. She’s not sure what though. It sits at the edge of her consciousness, just out of reach._

_She’s running through a maze of hallways, sure that if she can just get out she’ll find what she’s looking for, but every time she turns, there’s another dead end. Suddenly she comes to a door, and she’s in her childhood bedroom. Her dad is there, looking at her with such disappointment she can barely stand it. She runs away, trying to wipe the look in his eyes from her memory._

_She’s standing on the roof of a building, watching a battle happening around her. She sees herself, fighting with a figure who keeps blinking in and out of sight. Dread fills her. She’s been here before. She knows what’s about to happen._

_The building she’s standing on shakes, and the roof tilts as it collapses. Maybe this time she can stop it. Maybe this time she can save him. She throws herself off the building, racing to where she knows he is._

_She’s falling. The city drops away, and the sky is the only thing she can see. The ground is approaching fast, and she can’t stop. Can’t catch herself. She knows with utter certainty that she is about to die._

Clarke jerks awake, just before she hits the ground. She squeezes her eyes shut, trying to shake off the feeling of dread left over from the dream. It was just a dream. A dream that felt too real, but still, just a dream. A fresh wave of guilt washes over her, but she pushes it back. Just like she always does.

She takes a deep breath, trying to slow her racing heart, and opens her eyes, blinking against the unnaturally bright light. Once she orients herself to her surroundings, she finds herself in an unfamiliar room.

The last thing she remembers is being on patrol, looking for Monty, who’d been missing for almost a week. She had been checking central Harlem with Bellamy, but they had separated to cover more ground, and she doesn’t remember anything beyond turning down an alley off of Lennox.

Maybe she was injured? There’s no medical equipment by the bed, and the room doesn’t feel like a hospital, and besides, if she had been injured her mom would be here. No, that couldn’t be it.

Thankfully she’s not restrained, so she decides to get up and try the door. Maybe she’ll be lucky and it isn’t locked.

Her head pounds and her vision dims when she stands, and she has to brace herself against the bed to keep from falling over. Even when the feeling passes and she’s able to stand, she feels weak and shaky, which is a feeling she’s unaccustomed to.

She’s not lucky. The door’s locked. She tries to break the handle, a trick she picked up from Octavia, but it won’t budge. Even when she bears down on it with all of her strength. She only succeeds in hurting her wrist.

Panic rises in her chest. She hasn’t felt this utterly powerless since she woke up strapped down in the basement of a government facility, and she had volunteered for that. She needs to get out of here. She’s spent enough time locked up in her life to know that nothing good is going to happen here.

There’s a small window in the door, which is her best bet for getting out. She pounds on it, with what should be more than enough force to break even the toughest plexiglass, but nothing happens. That only makes her panic more.

She takes a deep breath, pushing the panic aside and trying to center herself. Something is preventing her from using her powers, but she’s been in the game long enough that she knows a thing or two.

She focuses all her energy into a single strike, punching through the small window in the door. The glass breaks under her fist, slicing her arm, which is concerning in itself, but it gets the job done.

She almost starts crying when she realizes that the door needs a key to unlock. Of course it does. Breaking out of something isn’t the same as breaking in. Why did she expect to be able to just reach through the window and turn the lock?

She retreats back into the room, looking for something to bandage her arm, and ends up using a pillowcase after spending five minutes unsuccessfully trying to tear a piece off a sheet.

After a while she hears footsteps coming down the hall. She presses herself against the wall next to the door, hoping that whoever it is sees the glass on the floor and checks the room. Sure enough, a man swears and the door unlocks.

She surprises him when he opens the door, grabbing the back of his head and smashing her knee into his face. Before he can recover, she puts him in a chokehold. He scratches at her, trying to gain any sort of purchase on her face or hair, but she increases the pressure on his neck until he passes out.

She grabs his keys and radio, thankful he’s alone, because she’s breathing hard from the exertion of taking him down. At full strength she can go through a dozen guys his size and barely break a sweat, but today is the first time in three years she’s been just a normal person.

The hallway is lined with similar looking doors, and the realization of what this place must be starts to dawn on her. She checks the door immediately across the hall. Monty is laying on the bed, but he looks up when she pounds on the window. It takes her a minute to find the right key, but when she does, she unlocks the door and let’s him out.

They take stock of each other. Monty is worse for wear, with bruises on his arms from restraints and IV tracks on the inside of his elbows.

“They got you too?” he asks, taking in the blood soaked bandage on her arm and their matching tank top and sweats.

“Yeah, I want to know who they are, but for now we’re getting out of here.” She glances down the hall, realizing that it’s unlikely they’re the only prisoners. Kidnappers rarely start with such high profile targets in her experience. “How many others are there?”

“At least forty or fifty I think, but it’s hard to tell because they never come for us at the same time.”

Clarke doesn’t want to know what happens when they come for them. She runs to the next door, determined to save as many people as she can. The face that appears on the other side of the door’s small window startles her so much she drops the keys. The last time she saw that face they were fighting on a rooftop in Queens.

She retrieves the keys and starts sorting through them, looking for the correct one. Just when she thinks she has it, an alarm sounds.

“We have to go, there’s no time.” Monty grabs her, pulling her away from the door.

“We can’t just leave them.” She starts trying keys at random. The first one doesn’t work, and the second gets jammed in the lock. She tries to pull it out, but Monty won’t let her.

“We have to go. We’ll come back for them, with the cavalry.” She can hear the incoming guards, and as loath as she is to admit it, he’s right. If they get caught then there was no hope for any of them.

“Fine. But, how are we getting out? Last I checked we’re depowered and there are a lot more of them.”

“No clue. I was hoping that you had a plan,” Monty shoots back as they run down the hall away from the approaching guards.

Clarke casts about desperately, but doesn’t see anything that looks like a likely escape route, and from the sound of the footsteps behind them, the guards are catching up fast.

She pulls up short, a plan forming. It isn’t the best idea, but it’s all they’ve got. Monty stops beside her, giving her a questioning look.

“The vents.” She points up at a ventilation shaft near the ceiling. “There’s got to be an exhaust outlet somewhere. And even if there isn’t, it’ll at least lose the guards.”

“How are we going to up there?” Monty asks skeptically. It’s a good question, especially given their current state.

“Can you do a pull up?”

“Not even on a good day.”

“Well then, I’m going to give you a boost and I’ll climb up after you.” Clarke says it with more confidence than she’s feeling because she’s not completely sure she can do a pull up right now either, but she doesn’t really have a choice.

She hoists Monty up and he pulls off the vent cover, which thankfully comes away easily. She doesn’t think about what they would do if it was screwed on. He clambers into the vent, his legs disappearing into the wall.

Clarke backs up to the far side of the hall and takes a running leap. To her relief she manages to catch the lip of the opening, and for a second she just hangs there, suspended five feet above the floor.

She hauls herself up, thankful that even without her powers, three years of super strength have left her in good enough shape to do a single pull up. She makes a mental note to thank Octavia for forcing her to train when she gets home.

The space is tight, and she can’t see much ahead of her other than Monty’s feet. He leads the way, and Clarke really hopes he’s taking them towards some sort of exit.

Her arm throbs and the tight space makes her panic start to rise again, but she pushes them aside, focusing on continuing forward. Eventually Monty stops, pressing his ear against the side of the vent.

“I think this is it.” He kicks out a vent cover and drops to the floor. Clarke follows him out into a small room that is taken up by a large fan set into the center of the floor. One of the walls is completely open to the air, treating them to a stunning view overlooking forest covered mountains.

It’s at least a thousand foot drop down a sheer cliff face, and Clarke quickly realizes that it’s their only way out. Which, normally wouldn’t be an issue, but the question of how they’re damping her powers and if they’ll come back once she’s out of the facility complicates matters.

“I think we have to jump.” Monty looks at her like she’s insane, which, to be fair, is probably the appropriate reaction.

“If our powers don’t come back, and we have no guarantee that they will, that’s a one way ticket to certain death.” He’s right, but she doesn’t have time to think about it, because the door bursts open, and a dozen guards come rushing in, guns pointing at them.

“I don’t think we have a choice.” Clarke grabs Monty and launches them into open air just as the guards open fire.

It takes six seconds to fall a thousand feet. Clarke knows this because she has jumped out of more planes than she can count in the last three years. She has lots of experience with terminal velocity.

But then again, Clarke Griffin can fly.

She’s never been afraid of the ground rushing up below her because it’s never been an issue before. She knows exactly when she needs to pull out of free fall to not go crashing into the ground or pass out from the g forces when she pulls up. And that point passed almost half a second ago.

She focuses all of her energy and strength on pulling up. On using the powers that she has never once questioned since the day she woke up in a government lab. She doesn’t want to die today. She especially doesn’t want to die at the base of a mountain in god knows where, without anyone knowing where she is.

Just as she’s about to accept her fate, she feels the familiar catch in the base of her stomach, and she knows it worked. She pulls out of the dive, hauling Monty with her. His legs barely miss the surface of the small river below them as she changes directions, trying her best not to black out at the sudden deceleration.

She slows as fast as she dares. She drops Monty on the bank a couple of hundred yards downstream before tumbling to a halt in the shallow water. She lays there, looking up at the sky, unable to hear anything other than her heart pounding in her ears. The sound of Monty retching eventually reaches her and she slowly sits up, taking in their surroundings.

The mountain they just fell out of looms overhead, dominating the horizon. The forest stretches out around them. The must be somewhere fairly far north because the leaves are already starting to turn, and it’s only the middle of September.

They need to get going, to put as much distance between them and whoever it was who took them as possible, but other than the uncontrollable shaking she can’t move. It’s been a long time since she’d been so sure she was going to die. But it does no good to dwell on the past. She knows that better than anyone.

Eventually Monty stops dry heaving and Clarke manages to push the dark thoughts out of her head and focus on the more immediate problem of getting the fuck out of the woods.

“That was insane. That was actually fucking insane,” Monty says when she helps him up.

“Look on the bright side: we did manage to escape.”

He shakes his head, obviously not over almost falling to his death. Which she really can’t blame him for. “Remind me not to go into the field with you again.”

“Well try not to get kidnapped then.” He lets out a begrudging laugh as they make their way into woods.

“I’ll do my best. Provided you also promise not to get kidnapped.”

Clarke shakes her head as she heads towards the trees. “Look at us, two of the premier superheroes in the world, getting kidnapped. Gotta step up our game.”

“Kane is never going to let us forget this, is he?” Monty asks. “He’s going to be all ‘I let you out of my sight for five minutes and what do you do? Get kidnapped. This is why I don’t let you do anything fun or interesting.’”

Clarke laughs at his passable impression of Agent Kane. “Ugh, I don’t want to think about how annoying he’s going to be when we get back. You can kiss not having an official government escort everywhere we go goodbye.”

“Why did we agree to do this again?”

“I think it had something to do with wanting to help people and also not spending the rest of our lives in prison.”

“I’ll take prison over wherever the fuck we are any day.” Monty gestures at the woods they’re traipsing through. “At least we were fed regularly in prison.”

Clarke doesn’t disagree. She is acutely aware of the fact that she is hungry and cold and has no idea how to survive in the woods.

They walk in silence for a long time, following the river. By late afternoon she thinks that they’ve put enough distance between them and the mountain rising behind them that she risks flying above the tree line, taking stock of their position.

“There’s a town maybe fifteen miles from here. I wanna say southwest, but frankly I’m not sure.” She gestures in the general direction of the town. “We can call for help once we get there, but we’re definitely not going to make it before nightfall on foot.”

Monty frowns. He knows as well as she does that they aren’t cut out for a night in the woods. She could fly them there much faster, but she doesn’t want to risk it. They could be anywhere, and there’s no guarantee that the locals will be friendly to strangers, especially strangers with powers.

“Maybe we don’t need to make it all the way to town,” Monty says.

“What are you thinking?”

“Did you see any telephone poles nearby?” Clarke realizes what Monty is suggesting.

“Yeah, there was one not far from here.”

“Perfect. I can use the phone line contact Raven and get us out of here.”

They head in the opposite direction from the town, silence falling once again. After a while, Monty gives Clarke a long look.

“Who was it?”

“Who was what?”

“Who was it in the cell? Who you were so adamant about not leaving behind?”

“I didn’t want to leave any of them behind.” It’s the truth, but not what he was asking.

“It wasn’t just anyone. You looked like you’d seen a ghost.”

She sighs. She isn’t sure why she doesn’t want to answer, but she owes him the truth. She did just push him off a cliff after all. “It was Anya.”

“The Grounder? But don’t you hate them?”

She isn’t sure what to say to that. It would be so much easier if she hated the Grounders for what happened to Finn, but well, it hadn’t really been their fault, had it?

“No one deserves to be locked up and experimented on.” Clarke knows that better than just about anyone. Monty does too. It’s an easy answer but he seems to accept it and lets the subject drop.

Thankfully it doesn’t take them much longer to make it to the phone pole. Monty considers climbing it before looking at Clarke. “A lift?”

“Hop on.” He jumps on her back and she flies to the top of the pole.

Monty pries open the box, looking at the mess of wires before selecting two and carefully stripping the ends with his nails. He takes one between the thumb and forefinger of each hand and closes his eyes.

They stay like that for what feels to Clarke like at least ten minutes, but she has no point of reference aside from the sun. And well, she’s a city girl at heart and has no idea how to tell time from the sun, other than that it should be overhead at noon.

After a while Monty opens his eyes, tucking the wires back into the box. Clarke takes them back to the ground, and he slides of her back.

“You got through to Raven?”

“Yeah, but it took forever. I couldn’t get through the encryption on her computer or her phone so I had to break into Octavia’s phone and message her that way. But, the good news is they know where we are and are sending someone to pick us up.”

“You can literally talk to machines but you couldn’t break Raven’s encryption?” Clarke asks skeptically.

Monty looks slightly abashed. “She made a point of Monty-proofing it last year after I broke into it and messed with her settings.”

Clarke laughs, relaxing now that help is on the way. She remembers the week Raven had spent yelling at Monty for changing all her backgrounds and screen savers to porn. “You really have to stop listening to Jasper.”

Monty shrugs. “What can I say? We were high and it seemed like a great idea at the time.”

“Remind me never to piss you two off then, if that was your idea of prank.”

“It’s Jasper you have to worry about. It’s always his idea.” Monty laughs as they settle in to wait for their team to pick them up.

“I don’t know why you always go along with his crazy schemes.” Monty and Jasper have gotten into more trouble than just about any of the rest of them, except maybe Raven.

Monty shakes his head, looking wistful. “I guess when you get arrested with your best friend, then experimented on in a secret government program and ultimately become superheroes together, it really bonds you.”

Clarke can’t help but smile. As annoying as her team is, and as horrible as the past three years have been at times, she can’t deny that they all have a special bond. They’ve been through some shit together, and she wouldn’t change it for the world. They’re her people, her family, and she loves than more than she would have thought possible.

It’s well after dark before help arrives. Apparently they’re in the Canadian Rockies, not far from the Alaskan border, so the helicopter that picks them up takes them to Juneau, and they get a commercial flight back to New York from there. The government is too cheap to pay for them to fly direct, so it ends up taking them nearly twelve hours to get home, and by the time they land at JFK Clarke is exhausted.

They’re greeted at the gate by Agent Kane and Clarke’s mom, who pulls her into a hug before examining the blood stained bandage on her arm. “They didn’t stitch this up already?”

“Would you believe that they don’t have diamond tipped needles at the Coast Guard station in Juneau?”

Abby hums judgmentally. “There’s no excuse for that.”

“I don’t think they see many partially invulnerable people around those parts, so it’s not really their fault.” Clarke feels bad for getting defensive within thirty seconds of seeing her mom, but she’s exhausted and in pain, and really wants to go home.

Agent Kane hustles them into a car, and they drive to the Federal Building in silence. Clarke isn’t looking forward to what she assumes will be at least a day’s worth of debriefing. It’s been the better part of four days since she was taken, and she’s worried about her dog, all alone in her apartment without her.

The rest of the team is waiting for them when they get back to headquarters. The hug Octavia gives her is long and bone crushing in the way that only Octavia can be. “I’m glad you’re back. We were worried.”

It takes all Clarke has not to completely fall apart right then, and she’s glad that she can hid her face in Octavia’s shoulder. She hasn't really thought about what the past few days must have been like for the rest of the team. It was bad enough when Monty disappeared, but with both of them gone it must have been truly terrifying.

“We need to get you two to medical so I can check you out and get you cleaned up,” Abby says, after everyone has gotten chance to greet them. Clarke dutifully lets her mom shepherd her into medical, somewhat surprised when the rest of the team insists on coming with.

“If you think we’re letting them out of our sight, you’re crazy,” Raven says when Kane tries to turn them away. Octavia and Bellamy both take up defensive stances, daring Kane to try and move them. They’re fierce protectiveness makes Clarke feel lighter. No matter what happens, they have her back, just like she has theirs.

“Can we do the debrief here? I don’t know about Monty, but I really just want to go home and go to bed,” Clarke asks as her mom starts to clean the cut on her arm.

“I have no intention of forcing you to stay here any longer than necessary today,” Kane agrees. “We can get started whenever you’re ready.”

Clarke looks at Monty, who nods.

“Let’s start at the beginning then.” Kane pulls out his tablet to take notes. “We extracted you two from the Canadian Rockies, just southwest of Whitehorse. Any idea how you got there? Monty?”

Monty shakes his head, but starts relating his version of the past week. “Last thing I remember was being out on patrol in the Bronx with Jasper. I didn’t see or hear anything out of the ordinary. Next thing I know I’m waking up in a strange room and I can’t use my powers.”

Monty hesitates, obviously not wanting to continue, but he swallows and keeps going. “Every day they came and took blood, and twice they took me to a separate room where they hooked me up to a machine and took a bunch of readings. I have no idea what they were doing though.”

“Did you hear anything that might be useful? Anything specific about personnel or plans?” Kane asks.

“I didn’t see anyone except the guards and the doctor, Tsing I think her name was, and they never discussed plans.”

“You said your powers were gone, any idea about how they managed that?” The rest of the group looks uncomfortable at that idea, and Clarke can’t blame them. That was the worst part, the powerlessness.

“No. It was like they were still there but I just couldn’t access them. When they hooked me up to the machine I could still feel it, but I couldn’t affect it in any way.”

“However they’re doing it, it’s proximity based,” Clarke adds. “They came back pretty suddenly when we were a ways away from the facility.” She doesn’t elaborate on how exactly she knows that.

Kane makes a note before turning to her. “What about you? Do you remember anything about being kidnapped that might help us identify who took you?”

“It’s pretty much the same story as Monty. I was out on patrol in Harlem looking for Monty. The last thing I remember is checking an alley, and then I woke up in a strange room in Canada apparently.” She winces as her mom ties off the stitches in her arm.

“Did they also take blood and run tests?”

“I wasn’t there long enough for that,” Clarke shrugs.

“How exactly did you escape?”

“I punched through the window, which is how I got this,” she gestures at her arm, which her mom is now bandaging. “Which, didn’t actually accomplish much, but a guard came by to check it out, and when he unlocked the door I used that knee to the face move that Octavia likes.”

Octavia looks proud. “I told you that was a good move.”

“And I will never doubt you again, O.”

Kane gives them a stern look. Octavia rolls her eyes, but Clarke continues her story. “So I knocked him out and took his keys. Then I freed Monty and we escaped.”

“You know we need more detail than that.”

Clarke shrugs, not feeling much like given him the exact blow by blow. “Standard stuff. Climbed through the vents until we found an external outlet, jumped off a cliff, and then trekked through a forest. You know, the usual.”

Kane looks like he’s about to press for more detail, but Clarke cuts him off. “We weren’t the only ones there. There was an entire hallway lined with cells, and Monty says there were at least forty or fifty others. I didn’t have time to save them, but we have to go back for them. We can’t just leave them there.”

Kane and Abby exchange a look, and Clarke’s heart sinks. She knows that look. It’s the look that says that Kane has already made up his mind and it doesn’t matter what she says. But she has to try, because she didn’t agree to be a member of this team to worry about the greater good as defined by the US government.

“Please. We have to help them.”

Kane sighs. “Right now we have almost zero intel to go on, aside from the coordinates where we picked you two up. We don’t know who this group is or what they want. Add to that that they can neutralize your abilities, and I can’t send you guys in. For now we’ll monitor their activity and gather intel.”

Clarke can’t say she’s surprised, because lately it feels like they’re less about helping people and more about doing whatever will make the government look good, but she’s still disappointed. She really thought that they would do something about the mysterious group that’s kidnapping people. That kidnapped her.

Bellamy comes to her defense. “We can’t just do nothing. Whoever they are, they kidnapped two of the highest profile superheroes in the world, without leaving a trace. That means no one’s safe. And they must be planning something big, because why else take such a big risk?”

Kane’s taken aback. Bellamy almost never challenges him. Clarke, Octavia, and Raven challenge him constantly, but not Bellamy. “Like I said, we have to do our due diligence on this one. We’ll gather intel and then see if there’s something we can do. We can’t risk sending you in blind.”

His answer doesn’t satisfy Clarke, and from the looks on the other’s faces, they don’t like it either. At least she’s not alone in this.

“For now, be careful,” Kane continues. “No more late night solo patrols or unnecessary risks. And keep your phones on so we can track you if need be.”

“Big brother much?” Raven says sarcastically.

Octavia rolls her eyes. “You say that as if you’re not literally big brother in this situation.”

“Hey, I do not engage in illegal tracking of American citizens. Much.” Raven defends, while everyone else laughs.

It seems like the meeting is over, and Abby has moved on to Monty, so Clarke gets up, turning to Kane. “Are we done here? I just want to go home and go to bed.”

“You’re free to go. You both can take the next couple of days off if you want, but check in regularly.”

“I’m taking you home,” Octavia says as the others start to disperse.

“It’s like three in the afternoon. I can make it home by myself.” Clarke knows she’s not going to change Octavia’s mind, but she doesn’t like being treated like a child.

“Tough shit. Go find some real clothes and then I’m taking you home.”

Clarke realizes that she’s still wearing the dirty sweats and tank top from the mountain. The Coast Guard in Alaska gave her a sweatshirt to wear, but she desperately needs a shower and and clean clothes.

“Fine.” There’s no use arguing with Octavia once she’s made up her mind, and Clarke’s desire to go home far outweighs her desire to argue with Octavia.

Clarke heads to the locker room, where she has a change of clothes stashed. One thing she’s learned in this job is that you never know when you’re going to need fresh clothes.

She runs into Wells in the hall, and he stops to greet her. “Clarke, it’s a relief to have you back.”

“It’s a relief to be back, trust me.”

“I just wanted to let you know that you’re supposed to meet with a local Girl Scout troop tomorrow at 9, but we can reschedule it if you want, considering the circumstances.”

She and Wells don’t always see eye to eye, particularly since he had taken over running the PR side of the team, which always seems to fall squarely on Clarke’s shoulders, but he is still a good friend.

“Yeah, I really don’t think I’m going to be up for that. Sorry.”

“Don’t worry about it. I’ll tell them that Skygirl has pressing matters to attend to, and push it off until next week.”

Clarke winces at the moniker. The press had dubbed her Skygirl after the team’s first outing, and it had stuck. She hates it, but since she’s become the public face of the team she can’t shake it. Skygirl and the Delinquents are a favorite topic of the Post. At least she’s gotten off better than Bellamy, who they’ve dubbed Fireman.

“Thanks, Wells, you’re the best.”

He smiles warmly at her. “No problem. Just take care of yourself.”

She finds Octavia waiting for her outside the locker room after she changes. “Really? You don’t need to babysit me.”

Octavia gives her a long look as they head out of the building. “I know I don’t need to, but jesus Clarke, you just disappeared.”

She knows she’d be doing the same thing in Octavia’s place, so she can’t really fault her, but she’s an adult and she doesn’t like being monitored, even if it is her best friend.

“Anyways,” Octavia continues. “I’m not doing it for you. I’m doing it for your dog, who will need to go out when you get home, but I doubt that’s something you want to do right now.”

“You took care of Allie while I was gone?” In the moments she’s actually had time to think in the past few days she’s worried about if her dog was being looked after, and it’s a relief to hear that Octavia had it covered.

“Of course. You know, she could stand to get more exercise. You should start running with her.”

It’s an old argument she has with Octavia, who seems to think that Clarke should take up running. “I’ll jog when I’m dead.”

Octavia rolls her eyes at Clarke’s petulance. “I don’t understand why you’re so against it. You literally have super strength. It’s not like it would hard.”

“It’s the principle of the thing.”

She dozes off against Octavia’s shoulder on the long train ride to Brooklyn.

When she finally gets to her building, she can hear Allie whining through her apartment door. The large golden retriever nearly knocks her over in her enthusiasm when she opens the door, which makes Octavia laugh.

“Hey girl, I hope you were good for Octavia.” Clarke sits on the floor, petting Allie while the dog licks her face.

“Other than the sad looks she gave me for not being you, she was a good girl.” Octavia grabs Allie’s leash, and much to Clarke’s chagrin, Allie’s attention snaps to Octavia. “Come on girl, let’s go for a walk and let Clarke here get cleaned up.”

Allie gives Clarke one last look before trotting over to where Octavia is standing by the door. “I promise I’ll be here when you get back, girl. I won’t disappear on you again.”

She isn’t sure who she’s trying to reassure more, Allie or Octavia. Or maybe herself.

She spends a long time in the shower, as if the scalding water can burn the feeling of being in that place from her skin. It doesn’t work, but she does feel better, more human, and by the time she’s done, Octavia’s back.

“Thanks for taking Allie out.”

“No problem,” Octavia says, as Allie bounds back over to Clarke. “Do you want me to hang out here for a bit?”

“No thanks. I think I’m just going to crash anyways.” Octavia gives her a searching look, obviously hesitant to leave Clarke alone. She appreciates her friend’s concern, but she really just wants to be alone. “Don’t worry, I’ll be fine.”

Thankfully Octavia doesn’t argue, giving Allie one last pat before she leaves. Clarke bolts the door behind Octavia and is finally alone, but it’s not as comforting as she’d hoped.

Despite her exhaustion she lays awake for a long time, until Allie climbs into bed next to her, resting her head on Clarke’s ribs. She takes comfort in the solid physical presence of her dog and finally drifts into a restless sleep, haunted by figures hovering just out of sight.


	2. Chapter 2

Clarke wakes to Allie whining to be taken out. It’s not quite 5 am, which is far too early for anything as far as she’s concerned, but Allie is insistent. Clark obliges, taking her outside in the predawn chill. It’s late September and the heat is just starting to break, but this morning is unusually cold. 

She tries to go back to sleep, but she’s restless, and after nearly an hour of tossing and turning she gives up. She decides to go for a walk to clear her head, and grabs Allie’s leash, but the dog just gives her a doleful look, burrowing into the spot she just vacated in the bed.

“You’re such a wimp,” Clarke chastises. Allie ignores her, unwilling to go back out in the cold. 

Clarke walks through Brooklyn in the early morning twilight, eventually finding herself at the base of the Brooklyn Bridge. It’s dark enough still that no one notices when she flies up to the top of the near tower, setting in to watch the sun rise over the city. 

It’s one of her favorite places, seeing the city laid out below her puts it all into perspective. She comes here to think, or clear her head, or just to be alone with the city she has come to love. 

She’s not from New York. She grew up in suburban DC, but sometime in the past couple of years New York became more a home to her than DC ever was. DC had expected her to be someone who hadn’t existed for a long time. It was too aware of her name and legacy to ever really accept who she’s become. 

But New York? New York doesn’t care about who she was or who she could have been. For better or for worse, New York only cares about who she is. The people don’t give a shit about Clarke Griffin and the legacy she was born into, they only care about what Skygirl can do for them. It’s comforting, in a way, to be loved and hated in turn based solely on what she’s done, and not on who she is.

Because sometimes she doesn’t really know who she is anymore. It feels like pieces of herself keep being torn away, and she’s not always sure she likes what’s left. She can’t find the girl who threw away her bright future to help her dad expose a government conspiracy anymore. But she really shouldn’t be surprised. That was before she spent a year in prison without trial, before she let her mom talk her into being a guinea pig for the same government program her dad had died trying to expose, before she agreed to do the government’s dirty work on the off chance she might get to help people. Before she hadn’t been able to stop the boy she loved from dying.

But when she’s up here, watching the lights of the city slowly blink out as the sun burns off the early morning mist, it all falls away. None of it matters anymore, because this city thinks she’s a hero, and she will gladly bear that weight if it means that she gets to help even one person. 

It’s Anya’s face that she sees now, trapped behind an anonymous door in that godforsaken mountain. She knows without a doubt that even if there was no one else, she would still have to go back and at least try to free Anya, because Anya is a Grounder, and despite her own personal feelings about them, despite what happened, the Grounders are even more of this city than her team is. 

If she wants to help New York, she has to help the Grounders. 

And to do that, she needs to rescue Anya, which, from the way Kane was acting, seems to be out of the question. She doesn’t have the power to do it alone, even if she could convince the rest of the team to help, without the government’s resources behind them she doubts they can do much.

But then again, maybe she’s wrong. Maybe Kane really does intend on going after whoever it was who had taken them and he has Raven looking for intel on them already. Kane isn’t Jaha. He’s reasonable and genuinely wants to do the right thing most of the time, even if his hands are tied by governmental interests far too often.

Clarke calls Raven, hoping that she’s being overly pessimistic. The phone rings for a long time, and when Raven finally does pick up, she sounds like she’s just woken up.

“Hey, is everything alright?” There’s concern in Raven’s voice, and Clarke realizes what her calling at barely seven in the morning must look like, especially after the week they’ve had.

“Yeah, everything’s fine,” she reassures her. “I just have a question.”

“Can it wait until it’s not the crack ass of dawn?” Raven’s voice shifts from concerned to cranky, and Clarke can’t really blame her. “Why are you even awake this early? I expect this type of thing from Octavia, but not you.”

“I couldn’t sleep and no, it can’t wait.”

“Alright fine, what is it?” 

“Does Kane have you working on intel about whoever it is that took Monty and I?”

The line goes quiet for a long time; long enough for Clarke to wonder if Raven fell back asleep. When she finally does speak her voice is guarded. “No. I asked him about it yesterday, after you left, and he said that he was putting Wick on it, so they could handle it through more official channels.”

“Dammit.” Clarke’s heart sinks. Kane only assigns things to Wick over Raven if he wants to make a show of gathering intel but never wants to actually turn anything up. “Do me a favor, and look into it yourself?”

Raven hesitates. “Sure, but this is too big for you to go after alone, Clarke.” 

“I know. I just...I want to know what we’re up against, in case they come after us again.” It’s not exactly the truth, but thankfully Raven doesn’t question it.

“Fine. Can I go back to sleep now?”

“One more thing, can you send me a file with everything we already have? Just the debriefing notes and stuff from yesterday?” 

“Sure, but not until a reasonable hour of the day,” Raven grumbles. 

“Thanks. You’re the best.”

Clarke hangs up. What she needs to do is suddenly very clear to her. It’s not the most appealing option, but if Kane isn’t going to do anything about it, she needs to do something. The Grounders deserve to know what happened to Anya, and if she can do nothing else, she’s at least going to do that. 

She spends the rest of the day doing all the things that accrue after the better part of a week away. Groceries, laundry, various household chores. It’s late afternoon by the time Raven sends her the file she asked for, and she’s starting to question whether tracking down the Grounders is a good idea. The last time she saw them she was fighting them after all. 

For the first time ever she wishes she were capable of putting her head down and doing what Kane tells her, but that’s not who she is, so before she knows it, she finds herself standing outside an unassuming bar in central Queens. 

The only marking indicating it’s anything other than one of the thousand neighborhood bars on streets like this all over the city is a biohazard symbol in the window. Clarke isn’t sure whether she’s glad that the old intel file on the Grounders seems to be correct about their headquarters or not, because while she’d rather not have to go looking for them, she’d also rather not be here at all. 

She steels herself and goes in. It’s barely 6 pm, so there are only a handful of people in the place, and from a quick scan of their faces they’re all Grounders. A hush falls over them when she enters, and they look at her with expressions ranging from suspicion to outright hostility. 

Clarke recognizes most of them from the intel files she memorized when Kane had tasked the team with bringing them in last year. She takes stock of the room, hoping that she doesn’t have to fight her way out, because she doesn’t think she can. 

Lincoln and Nyko are in the middle of a game of pool, and even if they weren’t the farthest away, neither of them poses much of a threat to her, despite the way they are gripping their pool cues like weapons. She doesn’t see Gustus, but she assumes that the movement she hears behind her is him, probably taking a position between her and the door. That just leaves Indra and Lexa, who are both seated at the bar. Indra gets up, fixing Clarke with an aggressive glare. 

Clarke keeps her stance relaxed, hoping she can project the calm she is definitely not feeling. She’s not here to fight, and she doesn’t want to provoke anyone.

“I come in peace?” She says, trying to break the tension. It sounded better in her head, especially considering the way Indra shifts her stance to one better suited for a fight. 

Lexa finally looks up from the bar, turning in her seat to face Clarke. From the files Clarke knows that Lexa is the undisputed leader of the Grounders, and from experience she knows that she can fight with the best of them, but she’s taken off guard by the sheer amount of presence Lexa has. She commands the room effortlessly, and everyone else seems to instinctively defer to her. 

“What brings the great Skygirl all the way to Queens?” Lexa asks eventually, breaking the tense silence. Clarke isn’t sure what she had been expecting, but it sure as hell wasn’t sarcasm. 

She does her best not to shrink under Lexa’s gaze. She reminds herself that she too leads a team of superheroes and maintains eye contact, standing as straight as she can. “I have information for you.” 

“We don’t want your information,” Indra says. “The last time we took information from your people we walked into an ambush.”

She’s right. They had set up the Grounders with bad intel before to draw them out. This is starting to seem like less and less of a good idea. But she reminds herself that she came here for a reason.

“I know where Anya is.”

That gets Lexa’s attention. Her eyes widen slightly at the mention of Anya’s name, and she inclines her head for Clarke to continue, but not before Indra challenges Clarke yet again.

“Only because your people took her.” 

Lexa silences Indra with a look. 

“How do you know where Anya is?” she asks. There’s a challenge in her voice, but she seems willing to listen.

“Because whoever took her, took me too. I don’t know who it was, but there’s a group based out of northwestern Canada that’s kidnapping people with powers, and using them for some sort of testing. I don’t know much more than that, but I was at their facility, and I saw Anya.”

Lexa doesn’t seem convinced. She realizes that it sounds crazy, and frankly she’s not sure she would believe it herself if she hadn’t experienced it.

“And yet you’re here, and she’s not,” Lexa says coolly.

“I escaped, but I didn’t have time to rescue anyone except my teammate Monty.” She can tell that any good will Anya’s name had earned her is disappearing fast. “Look, I know that you don’t believe me, and you don’t have any reason to trust me, but I wasn’t sent by anyone to give you bad information, okay? Have your telepath scan me and see that I’m telling the truth.”

For the first time since she entered the bar, Lexa seems surprised. She looks at Lincoln, who shrugs and approaches Clarke. 

“You consent to this fully and freely?” He asks, standing directly in front of her. 

“Yes.”

“This will be easier if you relax,” he says, gently touching her temples. 

“I know the drill.” She’s been scanned before, when she was evaluated for the program, and whenever the team was sent on particularly sensitive missions. It wasn’t exactly pleasant, but she would do it if it meant gaining enough trust from the Grounders to walk out of the bar unscathed.

Lincoln makes eye contact with her, and she feels the lightest touch of his consciousness against her mind. She has to admit that he is either much better at this than the ‘paths employed by the government or just much more compassionate about it. 

It’s over almost as soon as it began, and Lincoln gives Lexa a nod. “It’s not a trap. She’s telling the truth.”

Clarke drops the file she brought on the bar. “This is everything we know about them, which admittedly isn’t much.”

“Why are you giving us this?” Lexa asks. She still seems somewhat suspicious, and Clarke can’t blame her. She’s risking a lot by coming here, but it’s a bigger risk for Lexa, because technically, the Grounders are breaking the law just by existing and she could be leading the authorities right to their doorstep. 

“You deserve to know what happened to your friend.” She shrugs. “I’m just trying to help.”

“What are you planning on doing about it?” Lexa asks, stopping Clarke as she moves to leave. 

Clarke looks away, guilt bubbling in her chest. “There’s nothing we can do. We don’t have enough information, and it would look bad if the superhero arm of the US government went charging into Canada.”

She tries not to sound bitter, but doesn’t succeed. 

Lexa gives her a long look, and Clarke feels like she’s being sized up. “I didn’t ask what your team or your bosses are going to do. I asked what you are going to do, Clarke.”

“Like I said, there’s nothing I can do.” Clarke says it with a conviction that she doesn’t feel, and turns on her heel, leaving the bar. She can feel Lexa watching her leave, and she has the distinct sense that the other girl is disappointed in her. Or maybe she’s just disappointed in herself. 

***

She avoids work for the next couple of days, but by the end of the week she's going stir crazy at home, so she makes the trek back to the Federal Building. There’s no real reason for her to go in, but she wants to talk to Raven, and she’s afraid that if she skips out on training with Octavia again, she’s going to show up at her door and force her to go for a run. 

She does her due diligence when she gets in, checking in with Kane and going to medical to have her mom check her stitches, before she makes her way down Raven’s office. Calling it an office is somewhat misleading, as it’s more of a lair than anything, with nearly every surface covered in either a monitor or some other piece of computer equipment, most of it custom built.

Raven looks up from where she’s elbow deep in the guts of a computer when Clarke opens the door. “Hey, I thought you weren’t supposed to come back until Monday?”

“I was going crazy sitting around at home all day,” Clarke says, closing the door behind her. “I just thought I’d stop by and say hi.”

Raven gives her a suspicious look. “Monty is literally the only person who ever comes down here to just say hi. What do you want?”

“I want to know if you’ve found anything on our friends in Canada.” 

“Not yet, but if there’s a trace of them anywhere online I’ll find them.”

Clarke huffs out a frustrated sigh. She hates being told to be patient.

Raven shakes her head and sits back in her chair. “Look, these things take time, especially if you want me to keep this quiet. I can’t look like I’m neglecting my other work, but like I said, if it’s out there, I’ll find it.”

Clarke can’t argue with that, and it has only been a couple of days. “Yeah, okay. I’m just restless I guess. I need something to do.”

“Don’t let Octavia here you say that. She’ll have you bench pressing cars or something.” Raven gives her a mischievous look. “Or Wells for that matter, unless you want to go on a three month PR tour.”

“Oh god, please no.” Clarke shudders at the prospect. “If you dare tell Wells that I was complaining about not having anything to do, I’ll tell him that you really want to come do PR with us. I’m sure he’d love to set something up with the whole not all heroes wear capes angle.”

Raven makes a face, but before she can say anything, her phone beeps. Clarke feels hers buzz at the same time.

“Well, speak of the devil,” Raven says. It’s a message from Kane summoning them to the briefing room. 

“I guess I spoke too soon,” Clarke says, as they head upstairs. 

The team filters in, and they all sit down, waiting for Kane. It’s been awhile since they’ve had a proper mission, and everyone sits in a tense silence. Kane finally joins them, handing each of them a file. 

“Ten minutes ago, a man with a gun hijacked a Staten Island bound ferry. He killed the captain and is now holding the passengers hostage, and is demanding to speak to the Delinquents. Normally the NYPD would handle this, but because the boat is currently stranded in the bay, there are limited tactical options.”

Clarke pages through the file, although there isn’t much, aside from a few surveillance photos that don’t show the man’s face. 

“Are they thinking terrorism?” Bellamy asks.

“Right now, it appears as if he’s working alone. According to people on the boat he keeps talking about ‘the people who killed his son,’ which makes any sort of organized terrorism seem unlikely.”

“Do we have an ID on this guy?” Raven asks.

“Not yet. He’s managed to avoid the cameras at the station, and we don’t have access to the ones on the boat yet.”

“I’m on it,” Raven says, getting up.

“The rest of you suit up. We’ll continue the briefing en route.”

Ten minutes later they’re in a helicopter flying over midtown Manhattan. Kane passes her a blueprint of the ferry, and points to where the gunman is located. 

“He’s here, on the main deck. As far as we can tell, there are at least fifty people trapped with him. The other hundred or so on the boat are scattered throughout the other two decks. Right now, your main objective is to diffuse the situation with as few casualties as possible. You know the drill.”

Clarke nods, and passes the blueprint to Bellamy, who studies it. 

“How do we want to play this?” Bellamy asks her. 

“We need to evacuate as many people as possible first.” He nods in agreement. They’ve handled situations like this before, and Clarke knows how unpredictable they are. Getting as many people out as fast as possible is the best way to prevent casualties if things go south.

“Monty can get us in here,” he points to a maintenance hatch on the side of the boat, “and the Jasper and I can clear the lower two decks while Monty hardlines into the boat.”

“Yeah, we’re going to need Monty to get into the boat’s system,” Raven says over the com. “It’s a completely isolated network so I can’t get into it’s cameras from here.”

“So there’s still no ID on this guy then?” Octavia asks.

“No. I’m tracking him on the cameras as far back as I can to see if I can get a clean shot of his face, but no luck so far.”

“Damn.” There’s only so much Clarke can do in terms of talking the guy down without some sort of information about who he is. She gets the feeling that this whole operation is going to be messy. But then again, they almost always are. “Alright then. Same plan as before. Monty gets Jasper and Bellamy in to start evacuating people, and once we have an ID on the gunman, Octavia and I will try and talk him down.”

Everyone agrees as the chopper lands at South Ferry and they get into a police boat that takes them out to the ferry, which is floating aimlessly just beyond Liberty Island.

They draw level with the ferry, getting as close to the maintenance hatch as they can. Monty finds a small access panel next to the hatch and pries it open. A minute later the hatch pops open, and Bellamy and Jasper disappear into the hull of the ship. 

“I’ve got the camera feeds,” Raven says. “I should be able to get a positive ID in a couple of minutes.”

Jasper and Bellamy work fast, and people soon start to emerge from the ferry. Clarke is getting restless, because the longer they wait, the more time things have to go wrong, but she also wants as many people out of harm’s way as possible before she goes in. 

The waiting is worst part of any mission. Patience isn’t her strong suit in general, but during a mission her brain seems to work overtime telling her all the possible ways things could go wrong, and waiting around for things to happen just makes it that much worse. 

Eventually Raven comes through, just as the last of the passengers are being escorted out. “Okay, I finally got a match on facial recognition. It took forever because he’s not in any federal databases so I had to search in state and local ones.”

“Cut to the chase Raven,” Clarke snaps, and she immediately feels bad. Raven is the best and if it took her that long to find him, then he must have been legitimately hard to find.

“Calm your tits, Clarke, we’re getting there,” Raven says, “I just thought you should know why it took so damn long. Anyways, his name is Robert Jones. Born and raised in Pittsburgh, he spent most of his career in IT, mostly as a contract worker. That is, until four years ago, when his son, one Atom Jones, died in prison, at which point he dropped off the grid.”

“Atom Jones, why do I know that name?” Octavia asks. Clarke has heard that name before too, although she can’t quite place where.

“Because, and this is the good part, when Atom Jones was arrested for trying to beat his math teacher to death he was imprisoned at Arkadia Juvenile Detention Center.”

“So when you say he died…?” The picture is starting to come together, and Clarke has a pretty good idea of what Raven is about to say.

“He was one of the first participants in the Arkadia Project.”

“Damn.” Just like she’s afraid of. Messy.

“We need to go,” Octavia says, breaking Clarke’s train of thought. She’s right, now that they have his ID and most of the passengers have been evacuated they need to go in. But all of the sudden Clarke gets the feeling that this is a very bad idea. She doesn’t like that he’s associated with the Arkadia Project, even if it is only peripherally. But she doesn’t have a choice. He’s already killed someone, and he has hostages. 

Octavia disappears into the hatch, and Clarke waits for her to get into position on the main deck before flying up herself. She lands lightly on the walkway, making sure to keep within view of the man standing in the center of the main cabin. 

The man is middle aged, and while he’s unshaven and looks like he hasn’t slept in several days, he’s otherwise generally well put together. He has an automatic rifle pointed at the head of a terrified young woman who’s cowering against one of the benches. About twenty or so other people are huddled against the benches in the cabin, with another dozen scattered around the walkway. 

She can feel everyone’s eyes on her as she enters the cabin. She spots Octavia just outside the door directly behind the man, ready to step in and take him down if Clarke can’t talk him down. 

She slowly approaches the man, keeping to the middle of the room, so if he shoots at her he won’t hit any of the passengers, but he keeps his gun trained on the hostages. 

“It’s about time.” His voice is shaky but determined in a way that tells Clarke that this isn’t going to easy. He’s here for a reason.

“You wanted to speak to us, sir?” Clarke asks, stopping about fifteen feet from him and adopting a conciliatory stance.

“I want you to know that I know. I know that they killed him. My son. I know how he died. They said it was an accident but I know the truth.” 

“Play dumb,” Kane says in her earpiece. “Stick to the official line and figure out if he actually knows anything.”

Even without Kane’s advice, Clarke knows how she’s supposed to play this. This isn’t the first time someone has come to her with conspiracy theories about Arkadia. It’s usually not so dramatic though. 

“Who killed your son?” Clarke asks gently, trying to make sense of his story as well as keep him talking.

“The government. Your bosses.” Well he wasn’t wrong.

“What was your son’s name?”

“Atom.”

“And how did Atom die?”

“He was at Arkadia. They said it was an accident, some sort of explosion, that killed all those kids, but I’ve been looking into it, and it wasn’t an accident. It was a secret government program to give people powers. They were testing it on imprisoned kids. Some of them, like you-,” he gestures at her with the gun and Clarke hopes that he’s going to give Octavia an opening, but he swings it right back to the hostages, “got powers. But the rest of them died. My son died.”

He’s exactly right, but Clarke isn’t allowed to tell him that. She wonders just how he figured it out, in that much detail. Usually people came up with crackpot theories about how the official story about the explosion had been a cover but they never actually managed to connect all the dots and put together what it was a cover for.

“Atom died in a tragic accident, sir. I was there. There was no secret government testing. Just an explosion at the chemical plant next door. It happened just like they told you.” It’s an easy lie. A lie she’s told a thousand times, but this time is different. This time it feels wrong, lying to him. No one deserves that. He’s just a father mourning his son.

“Is that what they told you to say? Because I know it’s a lie. I’ve talked to people who were there.” He presses the barrel of the gun against the woman’s head, his voice calm. “If you don’t start telling me the truth, I will start killing people. I’ve already killed the captain, so don’t think I’m not serious. I want the truth.”

He’s too calm. His evidence is obviously good enough that the usual line won’t work, and if Clarke has learned anything doing this job it’s that people with true conviction are usually the most dangerous. 

“Okay.” He looks almost startled for a second, like he wasn’t expected her to agree. “Okay, I’ll tell you the truth, on the condition that you stop pointing that gun at innocent people.”

“I’m not putting the gun down until you’ve told me everything.”

“I’m not asking you to. I’m just asking that you point it at me instead of these people who have no part in this.”

He looks at her suspiciously. “I’m not falling for that. You could be bullet proof for all I know.”

She pulls up her sleeve, showing him the barely healed gash on her arm. “I’m not bullet proof, okay? If you shoot me I’ll die just like everyone else.”

It’s just a lucky break that she happens to have fresh stitches, but it’s the truth. At best she’s bullet resistant, but she’s never actually tested it.

It works, and he raises the gun to her. The young woman who he had been aiming at scrambles away, pressing herself up against the wall. Clarke slowly reaches up and removes her earpiece. She doesn’t need Kane reprimanding her right now. 

“You want the truth? The truth is that you’re right, but not about everything. The truth is that your son volunteered.” That gets his attention. He takes a step closer to her, his aim never wavering.

“That’s a lie. My son would never volunteer for something like that.”

“He did. We all did.”

“Why?” There’s an edge of anger in his voice. It’s the first time he’s shown any real emotion and Clarke knows that she has him. Now she just has to keep him from shooting her.

“What was Atom charged with?” 

The change in subject catches him off guard. “What?”

“Why was Atom in prison?”

“He was a good kid. He just made a mistake.” He says it in a rehearsed way, as if he’s said it a thousand times, which he probably has. 

“A mistake where he beat a man half to death? He was what? 16? So he was probably tried as an adult. That means attempted murder, which would be fifteen to twenty years probably. But he was at a juvenile facility, so he probably plead out for what? 10 years, with placement at Arkadia until he was 18?” 

The look on his face tells her that she’s guessing correctly. She hates that she knows this much about the justice system, but then again, all her friends are technically criminals. 

“He only had what? a couple of months left before he was transferred to an adult facility? The prospect of ten years in an actual federal prison couldn’t have been appealing to him. He was scared. Fresh faced 18 year olds don’t last long in prison. And even if he had survived, then what? He would have gotten out in ten years, but he probably would have ended up right back in. A felony conviction is a heavy burden to bear. Can’t get a job, can’t get a loan, no one wants to rent to you. So you either end up dead on the street somewhere or back in jail.”

The man is legitimately angry now. The gun is shaking, but still firmly pointed at Clarke’s head. She hopes she hasn’t gone too far, but now is not the time to waver. She takes a breath and continues. 

“That’s where Atom was. That’s how he felt when they offered him the chance to get out. To have his record wiped clean, if he just volunteered for this program. Sounds pretty good doesn’t it? Yes there were risks, yes he might die, but if it worked, well, if it worked he’d in the clear and get to be a superhero. So he made the easy choice. He chose the program. And maybe it was out of complete selfishness, but maybe not. Maybe he actually wanted to help people. To be better. You said he was a good kid, so he would have wanted to be a hero. Atom wouldn’t have wanted this for you. He died trying to be a hero. Don’t tarnish that legacy by hurting these people.”

He’s crying now, but he still has the gun aimed squarely at Clarke. She knows she almost has him. 

“I know, Mr. Jones, because that’s why I volunteered. That’s why all of us volunteered. I wanted to be able to turn my mistake into the ability to help people. I know that Atom wanted the same thing. Be the hero he wanted to be. Let these people go.”

It isn’t the complete truth but it works. He lowers the gun, and Octavia grabs it from him. She walks him out of the cabin, handing him off to the police waiting on the deck below. 

Clarke takes a deep breath, trying to slow her racing heart. That had been too close. She steadies herself for a moment, before going to check on the hostages, making sure that no one is hurt. 

When Octavia comes back she glares at Clarke, but she waits until the police start removing the hostages to really lay into her. “What the fuck was that?”

“I was defusing the situation.” 

“Really? Because from where I was sitting it looked like you were provoking him for no reason.” 

She knows that Octavia is just concerned. Upset that the situation hadn’t gone as planned, but she was the one who had a gun to her head. “It worked didn’t it?”

“You can’t just put your life in danger like that.” 

“I wasn’t going to let him kill more people because of Arkadia. Because of us.”

“We didn’t kill his kid. That’s not on you. Letting him shoot you isn't going to bring his son back.” 

Octavia is right, but that doesn’t make Clarke feel any less guilty. They survived. They get to have a life, a great life, a life that none of them could ever have dreamed possible. But Atom is dead. And so are fifty-three other kids just like him. Just so a couple of them can run around playing at being heroes. Getting praise they don’t deserve. 

“He just wanted the truth, O. He didn’t deserve to die for that.”

“You can’t save everyone, Clarke,” Octavia says softly. 

“I can try.”

The ride back to the Federal Building is quiet and Clarke can feel the rest of the team watching her carefully. They had heard the whole thing.

“My office, now,” Kane says angrily as soon as they get back to headquarters. He hasn’t said a word since the ferry had docked, which means he must really be furious with her.

“You did good today,” Bellamy says, squeezing her shoulder as she turns to follow Kane. She nods, grateful to him for being on her side. He’s a good friend. 

Kane is pacing in front of his desk when she enters his office. “Close the door.”

She knows what’s coming, but that doesn’t make the prospect of being yelled at by her boss any more enjoyable. She closes the door and waits. Sure enough, after a moment he stops pacing and turns to her. 

“Can you please tell me just what the hell you were thinking? Because for the life of me I can’t figure out why you would tell that man highly classified information, and in front of fifty witnesses no less.”

“I was thinking that it was my best shot at preventing anyone else from being killed. You weren’t there. I had to make a decision and I chose to save people’s lives over protecting your bosses.” Clarke succeeds in keeping her voice level, but just barely. 

Kane doesn’t accept that. “Need I remind you that you are an agent of the US government? We have a job to do and that’s hard enough without you giving away sensitive information.”

“And here I thought that I was a superhero who’s job is to protect people.” She can’t keep the bitterness out of her voice this time. “That’s what I signed up to do at least.”

“No, you signed up to protect the interests of the United States. I don’t know why that’s so difficult for you to understand. You’re grounded until we can make sure that you haven’t just compromised national security. You are to stay out of the field until further notice. And if you want to remain a member of this team, I would suggest that you reevaluate your priorities.”

She’s offended by the implication that she doesn’t take her job seriously. She’s done plenty of things she’s not proud of in the interest of national security, and she’s sick of it. Sick of compromising who she is to protect someone else’s agenda.

“Ground me all you like, but you know as well as I do that you can’t fire me. Who would the Delinquents be without Skygirl, America’s sweetheart?”

She turns on her heel and leaves.

She practically runs into Wells on her way to the locker room to change.

“Just the person I was looking for,” he says brightly. “I wanted to let you know that I rescheduled your visit to that Girl Scout troop in the Bronx to Monday.”

“You should check with Kane to make sure I’m allowed. He might not want to risk me leaking sensitive information,” she snaps. She feels bad as soon as she says it, because it’s not Wells she’s mad at. He’s just doing his job. “Sorry, it’s just been a long day.”

He gives her a sympathetic look. “I don’t know what’s been going on with you lately, but you can always talk to me.”

She really doesn’t deserve such good friends. “Thanks. I really do appreciate it.”

He nods, understanding everything she’s not saying. “No problem. Just be at PS 157 at 4 pm Monday.”

“I’ll be there.” 

He’s why she stays. Him and Octavia and Bellamy and the rest of the team. She hates the things she’s done for this job, and who she’s become because of it, but she doesn’t regret any of it, because they’re by her side. She doesn’t know what she’d do without them. Who she’d be without them.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So I'm not sure how quickly I'm going to be updating this, but I'm shooting for once at week at this point. I have the next couple chapters written already, so I should be able to get them out consistently at least for now, because it's all planned out, and it's not like I should be working on preparing for my qualifying exam or anything like that...
> 
> Anyways, I hope you enjoy it!


	3. Chapter 3

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> sorry about the two week wait on this one, but, ehh, life got in the way, but I'm going to try and get the next one posted this weekend to make up for it (no promises because it depends on how much I can bug my beta to read it before I feel bad)

Clarke hates having to make PR appearances, but as far as they go, talking to kids isn’t so bad. Especially events like this one that are just meet and greets and don’t involve having to give any fake inspirational speeches about being a hero or overcoming adversity. 

The Girl Scouts of the South Bronx mostly just want to ask her questions and see her punch things, and Wells won’t let her punch things, so she just has to answer questions. Which, admittedly, is much more fun when kids are asking them than adults.

“Who would win in a fight: you or Fireman?” asks one of the girls. 

Clarke struggles to keep from laughing at the name the Post had given Bellamy. He hates it with a passion, which really only makes it funnier. 

“Fireman is my friend, so we don’t fight.” From experience she knows it isn’t a satisfactory answer, but both Wells and Kane have lectured her about encouraging the perception of team unity. “But, if we did fight, I would totally win. Some pesky flames can’t stop me.”

The kids laugh, and Clarke spots a shy looking girl in the second row, who keeps raising her hand and then pulling it back down as if she’s unsure whether she wants to ask a question or not. She looks slightly panicked when Clarke calls on her, but to her credit, she asks her question.

“Is it true that you were in jail? Because my cousin is in jail, and he’s bad, but you’re not bad, are you?”

The number of girls who nod solemnly in agreement with the question breaks her heart. “Yeah, I was in jail. I made some mistakes when I was younger, but everyone makes mistakes sometimes.”

“Why were you in jail?” the same girl asks, bolder this time.

Wells gives Clarke a stern look, as if trying to tell her to tread carefully, and the irony of the situation isn’t lost on her. She’s sure that Kane only approved this appearance assuming there was no possible way she could reveal classified information to grade schoolers. 

Wells doesn’t need to worry though. Clarke doesn’t think that 8 to 10 year olds would even understand the concept of treason or state secrets if she tried to explain it.

“I stole some stuff that didn’t belong to me.” It’s the most simplified version of the official story, but it isn’t technically wrong, and it puts an end to that line of questioning.

“Oh oh, I have a question,” says a girl in the back, who’s practically bouncing up and down. “I don’t like you as much as I like the Grounders, because they’re my favorite. Do you think you could beat Lexa in a fight? Because she’s the best, but you’re pretty cool too I guess.”

Clarke takes a second to consider that. She shouldn’t be surprised that the Grounders came up, because they’re more popular than the Delinquents in the poorer parts of the city, but the question takes her off guard. 

“Don’t fight Lexa!” another girl says before Clarke can answer. “Lexa’s nice. She saved my auntie from some bad guys last year.” 

There’s a chorus of agreement from the room, and several other kids add their stories of the Grounders helping their families. It’s touching, really, and Clarke feels the ever present guilt start to bubble up. 

She doesn’t know what to say. How to tell these kids that she has fought the Grounders and all that happened was that her friend died and they destroyed some property. How to say that the team they love so much is illegal in the eyes of the government that employs her. 

Before she can come up with something suitably political to say, another kid pipes up. “Don’t fight the Grounders, team up with them! Fight the bad guys together.”

The suggestion makes her think. Lexa’s question about what she was going to do about the mountain has been eating at her for the better part of a week now, and she had spent all weekend wracking her brains for something, anything, to do about it. But actually working with the Grounders hadn’t occurred to her. She files it away as something to think about later, and returns her attention to the kids.

“I like that idea. Maybe we’ll do that some time.”

After she finishes with the kids she changes back into her street clothes and checks in with Wells, who looks a little too relieved that everything went well. 

“See, I managed just fine, and didn’t give away any classified information. Go and tell that to Kane.” She’s only a little bit bitter.

Wells shakes his head. “You shouldn’t joke about that. We’re lucky that no one recorded what you said on the ferry. We really dodged a bullet.”

Hearing her oldest friend take Kane’s side fills Clarke with sadness. She wonders when they stopped being the idealistic kids who just wanted to help people. When plausible deniability became more important than saving lives.

“You know, I expect that from Kane. But I never expected it from you.”

Wells looks pained, but he at least has the decency to not defend himself. “I’m going to need your suit before you leave.”

Clarke let’s out a hollow laugh. “Wow. Kane really isn’t kidding about grounding me.”

“Sorry about this,” Wells says. 

She knows that he’s only doing what he was told, but it doesn’t lessen the sting of being stripped of her suit. It’s royal blue with white trim, her own design, virtually unchanged since she made her debut as a superhero years ago. 

It’s more than just a costume at this point. It’s a symbol of who she is. She may only wear it when she’s on official business or PR stunts these days, but she likes herself more when she wears it. She knows who she is when she wears it, which is more than she can say most of the time. More and more she can see that there’s very little that separates the heroes from the villains, and for her, it’s her suit. And now Kane is taking it away from her.

“Don’t worry, I won’t make you disobey your precious orders,” she snaps, pulling the suit out of her bag and throwing it at Wells. “You can go back to Kane and tell him I’ll be good.” 

She turns on her heel and leaves, trying to maintain her composure for the sake of the kids who are still milling around the school. She manages not to storm out, but oh god does she want to. 

She hopes the subway will calm her down, but it just makes her restless and angry. She gets off at the first stop in Brooklyn, hoping that walking the rest of the way home will help. It doesn’t make her any less angry with Kane, but it does help clear her mind. And gives her an idea.

It’s a bad idea. An idea that no one will like, but she’s done caring about what people approve of. She’s tired of letting Kane and his bosses control her. There’s a problem and she is going to fix it. Or at least she’s going to try.

She finds herself back at the Grounders’ bar in Queens. She doubts she’ll be any more welcome this time, especially with what she’s about to suggest, but she’s pretty sure that Lexa will keep Indra and Gustus from trying to fight her. Pretty sure.

Lexa looks up from where she’s talking to Gustus when Clarke enters the bar. Immediately everyone’s guard is up, and the few people not affiliated with the Grounders get up to leave, sensing trouble. 

“Skygirl graces us with her presence yet again.” Clarke can hear the question underlying Lexa’s sarcasm, but two can play at that game.

“Can’t a girl come in for a drink? This is a place of business, isn’t it?” She leans against the bar, challenging Lexa. From the corner of her eye she sees Indra cut off her exit, and Gustus shifts to put himself between her and Lexa, but she ignores them. Lexa’s the one in charge here. She’s the one Clarke needs to convince. 

Lexa sighs, bracing herself against the pool table. “Why are you here, Clarke?”

“I’m going to rescue those people from the mountain, and I want your help.”

“We will never help your government, after what they’ve done to us.” Indra spits. “Attacking us, vilifying us, just so you can be the golden girl who does their dirty work when we were here long before you or your precious team showed up.”

It’s not an unfair assessment. Indra’s been a hero longer than just about anyone, and all she’s ever gotten for decades of service to the city was attacked. 

“Indra’s right,” Lexa says. “How do I know that I can trust you?”

Clarke gets the feeling that Lexa isn’t going to ask twice. “You asked what I was going to do about the mountain. I can’t let those people die. But I can’t rescue them by myself, or even with my team. But I think that if we work together we stand a chance of getting your friend back.”

Lexa just stares at her, not giving away anything. After a long moment she nods. “If you can convince your team to help, and guarantee that there is no government involvement, I’ll consider it.”

It’s more than she has any right to expect from Lexa, but it still feels like a denial. “I need more than you’ll consider it if I’m going to put my ass on the line.”

“You’re not the one putting your ass on the line here,” Lexa shoots back, which, if Clarke’s being honest, is completely fair. “The only reason I’ve heard you out this far is because the last time you came here with good intentions, but I’m not going to ask my team to volunteer for a suicide mission based on that.”

“I gave you everything we have on this group already. Surely that’s gotta count for something.”

“What you gave us wasn’t intel, it’s guesswork.”

“Consider it a favor then, from one superhero to another,” Clarke says, hoping that maybe she can charm Lexa into agreeing to help. The file that Raven had put together on the Grounders last year had been very thorough. 

“Really, Clarke?” Lexa asks, obviously aware of what she’s doing. “I expected better from you.”

Lexa’s disappointment stings, but Clarke is not going to walk away empty handed. Not after the week she’s had. She has one last card to play. “You’d just leave Anya there? You won’t even try?”

Lexa clenches her jaw at the mention of Anya, and Clarke knows she’s struck a nerve. “Anya knows what she signed up for, same as the rest of us.”

“She needs you. I need you. This is bigger than just a few missing people, you have to know that. They’re not going to stop. But we can stop them, if we work together.”

Lexa looks away, and Clarke knows it worked. Eventually she looks back, determined. “Like I said, if you can convince your team and bring me actual information to work with, I’ll see what I can do.”

“Okay.” It’s the best she’s going to get, and she’s confident in her ability to convince her friends, and in Raven’s ability to dig up something substantial about whoever or whatever the mountain is. 

She doesn’t want to overstay her welcome so she leaves, but not before she hears Gustus and Indra arguing with Lexa. This wasn’t going to be easy, but for the first time since she woke up in the mountain she has real hope that they might be able to do something about it.

***

The next day she calls a team meeting. Or, more accurately, she asks Octavia to get everyone to come over to her place that evening, because Octavia is much more convincing than she is. 

One decent PR appearance isn’t enough to put her back on Kane’s good side, so she’s still grounded, and doesn’t bother to go to work. Which just means that she has more time to worry. Worry about what she’s going to say to her friends, and worry that they won’t be convinced, and worry that it’s not going to work. 

Kane took her suit, which means he’s serious about firing her if she steps out of line again, and well, this is less of a step and more of a giant leap out of line. If he finds out about this it’s not just her job that’s at risk, it’s all of them. 

She spends the afternoon pacing restless around her apartment, and Allie watches her with concern. Or at least, Clarke thinks it’s concern. It’s hard to tell sometimes. She might just be hungry.

Eventually the team filters in, looking alternately confused and concerned. She can’t blame them. It’s been a long time since anyone called a team meeting away from the base. 

Once everyone is assembled in her living room she cuts right to the chase. “I want to go after whoever it is that’s hiding in that mountain. Kane has no intention of doing anything about it, and I think that we should do it ourselves.”

The team exchange glances, shifting uncomfortably. Clarke gets the sense that this is something they’ve discussed without her. It’s Bellamy who finally breaks the silence. 

“Kane was right. We don’t have enough information about whoever they are, or the manpower, to effectively attack them. Especially if they can block our powers.”

That, at least, is an argument she’d been expecting. “Raven’s already working on intel for us. How’s that going by the way?”

“I’ve got a couple of leads. Well, more like breadcrumbs, but it’s going to be at least a couple of more weeks I think before I can get anything substantial,” Raven says. Bellamy gives her a surprised look. She obviously hadn’t told them about Clarke’s request. “Assuming the network I found is their system, it’s going to take me a while to get through their security, especially if I need to keep it on the down low.”

Clarke had been hoping for better news on that front. It’s something, but it doesn’t have the desired effect on the rest of the team. Octavia and Monty look like they want to agree with her, but Bellamy and Jasper don’t seem convinced. 

“Even if Raven can crack their system, we still don’t stand a chance against a well organized paramilitary organization. There are six of us, and who knows how many dozens of them,” Bellamy argues. “Those aren’t odds I like.”

“I have an idea about that,” Clarke says, suddenly unsure about how this is going to go over. “One of the people who was kidnapped was Anya, from the Grounders, and -“

“No.” Bellamy cuts her off, knowing where she’s headed. “We can’t work with the Grounders. I won’t work with them.”

“Why not?” Clarke’s temper flares. He could at least hear her out before shutting her down. “We have a common interest and we can use their numbers.”

“They’re dangerous criminals.” 

Clarke almost laughs at the irony of that. “So are we. The only difference between us and them is that we have the government behind us.”

Octavia puts an end to their argument, cutting Bellamy off before he can respond. “This is all a moot point anyways, because I highly doubt they want to work with us after we tried to arrest them last year.”

“I talked to Lexa. She said that if we can produce actual intel they’ll work with us.”

“Of course you talked to Lexa,” Bellamy says, voice dripping with angry sarcasm. “Of course you went behind our backs and brokered a secret deal with her. Need I remind you that Lexa killed Finn?”

The accusation hits her like a punch in the gut. Bellamy is supposed to be her friend. He’s not supposed to throw Finn in her face like a weapon. 

The room goes silent. Raven looks away and Octavia shifts uncomfortably. Monty and Jasper look between Clarke and Bellamy, who are both on their feet. Clarke takes a breath and tries to keep her voice from shaking with anger.

“We attacked them. They did nothing wrong, and we attacked them, because Kane told us to. I don’t know about you, but I think that Finn would have wanted us to try to be the heroes that we claim to be.”

Bellamy shakes his head. “Do what you want, Clarke, but I’m not going to help you break the law and betray everything we stand for.”

He leaves, slamming the door behind him. Clarke looks around the room uncertainly, Raven won’t make eye contact with her, and everyone else looks uncomfortable. It’s Jasper who breaks the tension, standing up. “I agree with Bellamy. Sorry, Clarke.”

He looks at Monty, who gives Clarke a sympathetic look. “I’m in. Whatever you want to do. No one deserves what they did to us in there.” Monty and Jasper follow Bellamy out. 

Clarke turns to Raven. She knew that Raven would be the hardest one to convince, but Bellamy bringing Finn into it was below the belt. “Rae?”

Raven shakes her head, finally looking at Clarke with shining eyes. “I can’t Clarke…I can’t work with them.”

Clarke nods. “I know.”

And she does. Raven had lost the most of any of them when Finn died. Clarke had lost her boyfriend, but Raven had lost her family.

“I’ll wait for you outside, O,” Raven says, getting up. Octavia nods, and turns to Clarke once Raven leaves. Clarke is fairly sure that Octavia will support her, but then again, she had thought the same thing about Bellamy.

Allie comes over and puts her head in Octavia’s lap and Octavia dutifully scratches her ears while considering Clarke. “I’ll do whatever you need me to do, Clarke, but I gotta ask, what’s this about?”

“I can’t let those people rot.” 

Octavia shakes her head, seeing right through Clarke’s half truth. “It’s more than that. We’ve made plenty of hard choices before. You know very well that we can’t save everyone. What is it about this one?”

Clarke sighs, running her hands over her face. She’s spent the last week trying to answer that question, but she's as confused as ever. “I don’t know, O…I guess I’m just tired of letting them control me. I signed up to be a hero, not a government pawn.”

“Okay,” Octavia says, and Clarke can see her forming a plan. “But we can’t do this without Bell and Raven. We can’t risk them going to Kane.”

“I know. And we need their help if we’re going to stand a chance.”

“I’ll talk to Bell. He’s just being an ass. And Jasper will do whatever Bell does.” Octavia sets her jaw stubbornly. Clarke doesn’t know anyone who can stand up to Octavia when her mind is made up. “You should talk to Raven. Give her a couple of days, but she’ll come around.”

“Thanks, O.” Clarke appreciates that at least one of her friends is on her side.

Octavia gets up to leave, giving Allie one last pat. “I trust your judgement, Clarke. You haven’t steered us wrong before. And unlike my brother, I don’t owe Kane shit.”

***

Clarke finds herself back on top of the Brooklyn Bridge the next morning. 

It’s a damp, cloudy day, and fog hangs low over the city, obscuring all but the closest parts of Manhattan from view. The weather matches her mood. She’s brooding, which she knows isn’t productive, but the events of the last couple of days weigh on her.

No matter what Octavia said, the whole thing feels like a failure. She couldn’t even convince her friends, who are supposed to be her family, to help her. Maybe they’re right, and she’s betraying everything she stands for.

But she doesn’t really believe that. She spent so much of her career doing morally questionable things at the behest of the government that she doesn’t stand for anything anymore. And this is her chance to do the right thing. To help people without having to sacrifice a part of herself in the process.

All she’s ever wanted was to help people. She’d been young when this all started. She trusted Jaha when he’d asked her to serve, and she’d believed Kane when he told her that what they were doing was right. She did was she was told and she never asked for more information. She tried so hard to be a hero. And she failed. 

She’s pulled from her reverie by a sound beside her, and she’s surprised to see Lexa sitting down next to her.

“How’d you get up here?” She asks, more out of disbelief than anything.

“I climbed,” is all Lexa offers by way of explanation. 

“You climbed the Brooklyn Bridge?” 

Lexa gives her a sidelong look. “The stairs, Clarke.”

“Oh.” Clarke had forgotten about the stairs leading up to the platform on top of the tower. She still doesn’t know why Lexa is here, but before she can ask, Lexa explains.

“I saw you up here, and I was…concerned.”

Clarke is touched that Lexa was worried about her, but she doesn’t know what to think about that fact, so she deflects. She raises an eyebrow skeptically. “You saw me all the way up here? A girl might think you’re checking up on me.”

Lexa taps her temple. “Super senses, remember?”

Clarke huffs out a laugh. “Lexalas, what do your elf eyes see?”

Lexa rolls her eyes at Clarke’s attempt at humor, but declines to respond. Clarke feels like she owes Lexa an explanation, or something at least, but she isn’t sure what to say, so they sit in silence. 

“I couldn’t convince my team to help,” she says eventually. “We won’t be able to get your friend back. I’m sorry.”

Lexa considers her for a long moment. Clarke can’t tell what she’s thinking. “I didn’t take you for a quitter, Clarke.”

Even though her tone is kind, Clarke winces at her words. “I tried…I just, I’m not like you, Lexa. I’m not a hero, not really.”

Lexa shakes her head, her eyes soft. “You were born for this, Clarke. Same as me.”

Clarke wishes she could believe that. “You’re wrong. I was made in a lab to be a tool of the government.”

“They may have made Skygirl, but they didn’t make you. You’re the one who sought us out and offered to help, because you’re driven to help people.”

Clarke sighs in frustration. “Yeah, but there’s nothing I can do. I can’t even convince my friends to help.”

“You will.”

Lexa says it with so much confidence that Clarke almost believes her. It’s a startling realization. The people she’s been to hell and back with don’t trust her, and yet Lexa, who has absolutely no reason think she’s anything other than an enemy, believes in her. 

Silence settles over them again. She’s surprised by how comfortable it is. Eventually Lexa looks up, her attention caught by something Clarke can’t hear. 

“I have to go,” she says. “You know where to find me, when your team comes around.” 

With that she’s gone. 

By the time Clarke gets up to leave it’s properly raining, and she’s cold and wet and wants to go home. But she feels lighter than she has all day. Like maybe she stands a chance after all.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> sorry not sorry about the lexalas joke, couldn't be helped


	4. Chapter 4

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> And lo! a wild chapter appeared!

Clarke fully intends to follow Octavia’s advice and wait a couple of days before talking to Raven, but she doesn’t have to, because three days after their team meeting Raven texts her asking if she wants to get coffee. 

Clarke meets her at a cozy cafe on the Lower East Side. She barely has time to sit down and order before Raven cuts to the chase. 

“I’m in. I’ll dig up whatever you need, and help however I can on the back end, but I don’t want to have to work with them directly. I’m not going to make nice and pretend like nothing happened, so it’s probably best if I don’t ever meet them.” 

“I can work with that.” Clarke hadn’t been expecting it to be that easy, but she’s not about to complain. “What made you change your mind?”

Raven looks down at her hands and takes a breath before answering. “I thought about what you said. You’re right: Finn would want us to work together. He hated that we had to fight them.”

“He always was the best of us,” Clarke says quietly. It’s strange, talking to Raven about Finn, even after all this time. 

“He saved my life, you know?” Clarke has heard Raven say that before, but she doesn’t know what it means. They haven’t actually talked about Finn’s death. It’s been nearly a year, and he still haunts both of them. 

Raven swallows hard before continuing. “I hacked into NASA, because I wanted to see the space station designs, but I got sloppy and they found me. He said it was him, because I was eighteen and he wasn’t, and he would get a lighter sentence. That’s why he was at Arkadia…it was my fault any of that happened to him. It was my fault he died.”

Clarke’s heart breaks for her friend. She reaches across the table and takes Raven’s hand, squeezing it gently. “It’s not your fault. He made that decision, not you. You didn’t force him to volunteer for the program or to try to fight Lexa knowing full well he was outmatched. He was good, you know? He just wanted to help people. None of what happened is on you.”

Raven doesn’t look like she believes it, but she nods, and they sit like that, not saying anything, until their coffee comes. 

“It’s not the same without you around,” Raven says, taking a sip of her drink. “You need to come back before Bellamy gets a big head and starts to think that he’s in charge.”

“If you have any suggestions for getting back on Kane’s good side…” 

“Don’t worry, he’ll come around. He always does. You’re his favorite after all.” Raven gives her a sly look. “Well, your mom’s his favorite, but that has to count for something.”

“Gross.” Clarke shoots Raven a disgusted look but she can’t help but laugh. It doesn’t last long though. “It’s different this time, Rae. He took my suit.”

Raven gives her a sympathetic look. She doesn’t really understand, she can’t, because as much as she’s part of the team, she’s doesn’t wear a costume. She doesn’t know what it’s like to have the suit and the name be all that stands between you and the darker parts of yourself. To be what tips the scales in your favor. But she’s spent enough time around the rest of them to know how important their costumes are to them.

“Maybe it’s a sign,” Raven says. Clarke’s confusion must show on her face because Raven continues unprompted, “you know, to get out. To go solo.”

It’s not like Clarke hasn’t thought about it, especially now that she has so much time on her hands. But she can’t do that to the rest of them. She may not need the team, but they need her. 

She shakes her head. “It’s like you said, I can’t let Bellamy get a big head thinking he’s in charge.”

Raven gives her a serious look. “No one will resent you when you do leave. We’ll still be your friends.”

“When? You make it sound like a foregone conclusion.” 

“Isn’t it?” Clarke doesn’t know what to say to that, so she just looks away. “You can’t not be a hero, Clarke. It’s who you are. Finn was the same way.”

It strikes Clarke that this is the second time someone has told her that. She just wishes she could believe it. 

***

She’s sitting in the park that Sunday enjoying the last of the nice weather when Bellamy finds her, taking the seat next to her on the bench. Clarke continues to watch Allie play with the other dogs at the dog run, not saying anything.

“Tell Octavia to stop harassing me about this Grounder thing,” he says after a moment. “I’m not changing my mind.”

“I can’t make Octavia do anything, you know that.” 

“So you didn’t tell her to bug me non stop about it?” He asks skeptically.

“That was all her.” 

He heaves a frustrated sigh. “I’ve been thinking about it for the last couple of days, and I just can’t figure out why you're doing this.”

She looks at him for the first time since he sat down, annoyance rising at the fact that he had sought her out to yell at her. “What exact is it that I’m doing, Bellamy?”

“This crusade of yours.” He waves his hand for emphasis, trying to find the right words. “You’re turning your back on us. On me. Kane and Jaha have given us so much, you more than anyone, and you’re just going to walk away and help the enemy?”

“I don’t owe Kane and Jaha anything. Not anymore. I’ve more than paid my debts.” She struggles to keep her voice under control, but she knows she isn’t fooling Bellamy. He knows her too well. “And the Grounders aren’t the enemy. They never were. Whoever is in that mountain is the enemy, and this is our best chance at stopping them.”

Allie comes over to them, dropping a tennis ball at Clarke’s feet and giving her an expectant look. She feels a surge of affection for her dog, who picked the perfect moment to distract her from the argument building between her and Bellamy.

“This isn’t yours, girl,” Clarke says, picking up the ball. “Who did you steal it from?”

Allie gives her a disappointed look when Clarke gently tosses the ball back towards a pair of border collies who had been playing with it earlier. “We’ve talked about this, girl. You can’t take other puppies’ toys.”

Bellamy laughs as Allie bounds away, seemingly unaffected by Clarke’s words, and the tension between them drains away. This is probably her best chance to convince Bellamy to help them she realizes, but if she’s not careful she’ll send him running to Kane. She weighs her next words carefully while they watch Allie playfully chase a husky around the park.

“You weren’t there, Bell. You didn’t see them. I can’t just leave all those people there to be experimented on.”

“I know, I do, but Kane hasn’t lead us wrong before. And besides, you can’t save everyone.” She wishes people would stop telling her that as if she’s never made sacrifices for the greater good before. As if she hasn’t spent the last several years trusting Kane when he asks her to make difficult choices. 

“When did that become our motto?” She asks in frustration. “When did we start hiding behind a greater good that we can’t even see? I’m tired of trusting Kane and Jaha to always know what’s right. I signed up to be a hero, not their lackey.”

“There are no such thing as real heroes, and you’re naive if you think that we were ever anything but flashy government agents.”

Clarke shakes her head. She can’t believe that, even if she knows on some level that it’s true. “Why do you just accept that? Don’t you want to be better? To live up to what people think we are?”

Bellamy doesn’t respond, but she can tell she hasn’t changed his mind. She needs him with her if she wants them to stand a chance. They need to be united if they’re going to be able to pull of a major operation without Kane finding out. And she could use Bellamy’s sheer fire power on this one.

“Remember our very first mission?” She asks, trying a different tack. 

“That car chase on the GW bridge, right?” He smiles at the memory. “You landed on the guy’s car, but he stopped and threw you like fifty feet.”

“Not one of my finest moments,” she agrees, wincing. “Remember what it felt like back then, before all the PR and secret government missions, when we were actually helping people? How long has it been, since you’ve felt that? Since you’ve really felt like a hero?”

Bellamy looks away, refusing to make eye contact. “I know what you’re doing, Clarke, and it won’t work.”

He gets up, and Clarke knows that this is her last chance. “Look, if you won’t do it for yourself, do it for me. I need this, Bell. After Finn…I need to know that I at least tried to do something worthwhile. To be a hero. And to do that I need you. Help me, Bellamy, please.”

He grits his teeth and shakes his head. Clarke’s heart sinks. She’s sure that he’s going to say no and any shot she had of pulling this off is gone. Lexa was wrong about her; she can’t even get one of her closest friends to help her.

“Fine,” he says eventually. “But, the second it even looks like we can’t trust them or things are going south I’m putting a stop to it.”

Relief floods her. It’s begrudging at best, and less than ideal, but she can tell that it’s the best she’s going to get. And besides, she knows Bellamy well enough to know that once things get going, he’ll be as committed as she is. 

“Thank you.” 

“Don’t thank me yet,” he throws back over his shoulder as he leaves. 

She watches Allie play, wondering just what she is getting herself into. 

***

It’s nearly a week before Raven is able to put together enough useful information for Clarke to go back to the Grounders. Octavia comes with her this time, and while she says it’s a show of support, Clarke is pretty sure that it’s more out of curiosity than anything. 

“Trikru,” Octavia reads from the sign above the bar’s door. “Weird name.”

“Weird place,” Clarke shrugs as they enter. 

The atmosphere is noticeably less hostile than the other times Clarke has been there, but it isn’t exactly friendly. Gustus glowers at them and Indra fixes them with her customary scowl, but neither of them get up from the bar, which feels like progress, if nothing else. 

“I see you brought your pit bull this time,” Indra says. “As if she could threaten us.”

Gustus laughs. “She’s too small to be a pit bull. And too pretty.”

“The way I remember it, the last time I saw you I was kicking your ass,” Octavia fires back. 

“Enough,” Lexa says, putting an end to the argument. “As long as we’re working together, Clarke’s people are welcome here.”

“I still don’t trust them,” Indra says, and Gustus grunts in agreement. 

“You’ve made your feelings clear. If you’d rather leave, you’re welcome to.” Lexa gives Indra a sharp look, and Indra backs down, although she doesn’t seem happy about it. Clarke briefly wonders if Indra ever looks happy about anything before she shifts her focus back to the reason they’re there.

Clarke tosses the flash drive Raven gave her to Lexa, who grabs it out of the air with ease. She inspects it and then gives her a questioning look. “What’s this?”

“Call it a gesture of good faith.” Lexa raises an eyebrow at that, but declines to comment. “It’s all the information we’ve managed to dig up so far. It’s mostly just plans for an abandoned RCMP facility in the mountains outside of Whitehorse and some other things available in the public record, because we haven’t been able to crack their network yet, but it’s a start.”

Lexa passes the drive to Nyko, who goes to a door in the back that Clarke hadn’t noticed before. The rest of the Grounders move to follow him.

“Coming?” Lexa asks. Clarke’s surprise at the invitation must show on her face, because Lexa’s eyes soften. “We’re working together, aren’t we?”

Clarke is expecting an office of some sort, not a room nearly twice the size of the bar itself. Half the space has been converted into a gym, with weight racks and training equipment, not unlike the gym back at their own headquarters. The other half is taken up by a table strewn with gear and a desk with multiple computer monitors. 

“Now I see why you guys hang out at this dive,” Octavia says, clearly impressed by the set up. 

“You don’t know all our secrets,” Lincoln responds lightly, with a soft smile. 

“And you better not tell her all of them,” Nyko says gruffly, sitting down at the computer and pulling up the contents of the drive. He clicks through the various blueprints and requisition orders while Lexa watches. 

Clarke, for her part, watches Lexa. 

She is clearly in charge, and even Indra, who was one of the very first super powered vigilantes in the city, defers to her. She’s young, only a few years older than Clarke, and by all accounts she’s be leading the Grounders since she was a teenager. But for all the information they have on the Grounders, on Lexa specifically, Clarke still doesn’t know why. 

What kind of person gives up any chance at a normal life to do this job? Had she had a real choice in the matter, Clarke wouldn’t have chosen it. She would have been a doctor like her mom and lived a nice, normal life. But some people are never meant to be normal. 

“We’re going to need a couple of days to go through this,” Lexa says, startling Clarke out of her reverie. “We should meet again soon, to start planning.”

“How can I contact you, other than just showing up here I guess?” It’s not like she has anything better to do than make the hike out to Queens, but it seems somewhat impractical to do every time they need to coordinate something.

Nyko pulls a phone out of one of the desk drawers and tosses it to her. “Here’s a burner. It’s already programmed with our numbers so you can get in touch with us. Try not to lose it. They’re more expensive than you’d think.”

“Burners, how old school,” Octavia says. Clarke knows Octavia well enough to know that she doesn't mean it disrespectfully, but Indra bristles at her tone. 

“You new wave heroes think you know everything about this business, with your fancy tech and your government funds, but not all of us are so lucky. Some of us rely on skill and experience.” It’s a challenge, and it gets the desired rise out of Octavia, who’s never one to back down from a fight.

“You think I can’t take you, old timer? Because I seem to recall winning the last time we fought,” Octavia says. She moves closer to Indra, challenging her space. 

Clarke tenses. She certainly can’t stop Octavia if she starts a fight, and she’s just started to earn Lexa's trust. She looks around, trying to gauge just how much trouble they're in, but everyone else is surprisingly relaxed. Even Lexa looks more curious about how this will play out than anything. 

Indra laughs. “You're less intelligent than I thought if you think you were winning that fight.” 

“What’s that supposed to mean?” 

“You think you know how to fight? Punching something into submission isn't the same as fighting. Fighting is an art.”

“Why don't we test that?” Octavia asks, gesturing at the sparring mat. 

“Octavia -” Clarke moves to break them up, not wanting to jeopardize their newfound peace, but Lexa cuts her off. 

“If you’re going to fight, it'll be a proper match, with rules,” Lexa says. “I won’t have you two killing each other.”

“Bring it,” Octavia says, shucking off her jacket. Indra just nods, crossing to the other side of the mat. 

“This is crazy, we should go,” Clarke says, trying to pull Octavia away, but she refuses to budge. 

“Relax Clarke, I'm not going to hurt her. Much.” Octavia hands Clarke her jacket and starts to loosen up.

“This is a horrible idea. We just got them to agree to work with us.”

“Stop worrying so much about your damn alliance. No one else seems to mind.”

Clarke can't argue with that. Gustus is in Indra's corner helping her warm up, and everyone else has gathered around the mat, looking more curious than hostile. 

“Fine, but try not to do anything that will both of us killed.” 

Octavia rolls her eyes as Clarke leaves her to finish warming up. She hovers at the edge of the mat next to Lexa, who is much calmer about this entire thing than Clarke thinks she has any right to be. 

“You’re wondering why I’m letting this happen,” Lexa says, never taking her eyes off of the combatants. She’s right. Clarke expects this from both Octavia and Indra, but not from Lexa, who seems committed to their alliance. “If they’re going to fight, it’s better that they do it now. Let them get out their aggression here. It keeps things from building up. And besides, some alliances are best forged in blood.”

“That’s...that’s smart, actually.” Clarke is taken aback by how well Lexa read the situation. It had taken her months of working with Octavia to figure out that sometimes it was better to just let her fight things out, but Lexa had picked up on that in all of twenty minutes.

“I’ve been doing this for a long time, Clarke.” A smile ghosts across Lexa’s face, before she schools her features back into the cool indifference she seems to always wear, turning to Indra and Octavia. “This is a sparring match, not a fight to the death so the standard rules apply, with the winner determined by knockout or tap out. No holds barred, but nothing dirty. And try not to break anything, including each other.”

With that, they start circling each other. Octavia moves first, darting in and back out, trying to bait Indra into an attack, but it doesn’t work. Indra is patient, crouched low in a perfectly balanced stance, giving Clarke the distinct impression of a predator waiting to pounce. 

Octavia tries a few light jabs that Indra easily avoids, content to wait Octavia out. Octavia takes the bait, closing the distance and throwing a heavy cross. Indra side steps and counters with a flurry of punches to Octavia’s body. 

Octavia backs off, regrouping. She charges in again, ducking under Indra’s jab and landing a solid hook to body before Indra pivots away, hooking her foot behind Octavia’s leg and throwing her off balance. Indra rams the heel of her hand into Octavia’s solar plexus, and Octavia goes down, gasping for air. 

Indra circles as Octavia struggles to stand, unwilling to tap out. 

“Is that all you got?” Octavia asks as she gets to her feet, breathing hard. 

Indra lets out a low laugh as Octavia charges back in. Indra deftly avoids Octavia’s punch, stepping in and landing an elbow across Octavia’s face that sends her down again. 

Indra turns away as Octavia shakes it off, clearly dazed. But Octavia gets up once again, and attempts to take advantage of Indra being off guard, tackling her. Before Octavia can close the distance, Indra pivots, landing a side kick that would have gone through just about anyone else. Octavia goes flying into the wall, but she pushes herself to her feet, clearly intent on continuing.

“We’re done,” Indra says, stepping off the mat.

“Like hell we are.” Octavia insists, too stubborn to quit. But her words are undercut by the fact that she can barely stand. 

“You fight like a child,” Indra says, going over to help her up. “All aggression, no discipline. But you do have spirit.”

Octavia accepts Indra’s hand. “You’re going to have to show me that take down move you used sometime.”

“You’re going to have to learn how to not run into punches first.” 

Clarke turns to Lexa, taken aback by how fast their animosity has turned to begrudging respect. “How did you know that would work?”

Lexa shrugs. “Like I said, I’ve been doing this a long time. And our people are not that different.”

Clarke watches Octavia interact with the rest of the group, who now seem to have some modicum of respect for her, and it occurs to her that Lexa is right. They may have been sworn enemies not that long ago, but they’re really not all that different.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This is were we all agree to pretend that I know anything about how fighting works
> 
> Also, fun, somewhat related fact: all the dog runs in new york city parks are labelled in latin for some reason (canus circus)


	5. Chapter 5

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Warning for references to sex trafficking (not involving any of our characters, but like, it's still there so)

Clarke spends the next several days going over the the documents Raven found again and again, unable to come up with anything resembling a useful plan of attack. There just isn’t enough there, even when Raven gives her another flash drive of information to pass on to Lexa. 

Lexa and Nyko are the only Grounders at the bar when Clarke shows up to drop off the drive. 

“It’s quiet tonight,” Clarke notes as Lexa leads her into the back room. “Where is everyone?”

“Working,” is all Lexa says in response. 

Once they’re alone, Lexa turns to her, tossing the drive on the table. “I don’t suppose this has any useful information on it this time?”

Clarke is taken aback by how cold Lexa is. She wouldn’t characterize them as friends, but this is starkly different from their previous interactions. She’d thought that Lexa had come to respect her, if nothing else.

“What’s that supposed to mean?” Clarke snaps. It comes out harsher than she intends, but she doesn’t bother to correct it.

Lexa sighs. “I’m sorry, Clarke. I can’t ask my team to run off to Canada based on what you’ve given us so far. Unless you can produce more useful information I don’t think this is going to work.”

“We’re still working on breaking into their network. We’ll have real information to plan with soon.” Clarke leaves out the part where Raven is no closer to getting into their network than she was a week ago. 

“I’m starting to doubt that,” Lexa says, seeing right through Clarke. “And even if you do, then what? All we know so far are the plans for a nearly impenetrable base and orders for enough supplies to feed and equip several hundred people. And on top of that it’s going to start snowing in Whitehorse soon.”

She’s right, but Clarke isn’t about to take no for an answer. Not after the trouble she’s gone to convincing her team to help. “What’s this about, Lexa? A week ago you were defending this, and now you want nothing to do with us?”

“That was when I thought this plan of yours had a chance of working,” Lexa says under her breath before standing straight and meeting Clarke’s eyes. “Things change, Clarke. We have important work to do in the city, and I’m not jeopardizing that for some wild goose chase.” 

Clarke can’t accept that. She won’t accept it. It’s too similar to what everyone else has said. She can take it from Kane and Bellamy, but not from Lexa. She doesn’t think about why she cares more about whether Lexa is on her side than her friends or her boss. 

“No.” 

Lexa looks surprised by Clarke’s challenge. She steps back slightly, bumping up against the table behind her, and Clarke follows, pushing into her personal space. “I thought you were a hero. That’s what everyone says, at least. That you help people. There are people in that mountain that need our help. No one else is going to rescue them. No one else even knows they’re there. And you’re saying no?”

“Why do you care so much?” Lexa asks, refusing to back down, even in the face of Clarke’s anger.

“Why don’t you?” Clarke shoots back. 

Lexa doesn’t have an answer for that. She glares at Clarke, who is suddenly very aware of how they’re practically pressed up against one another. Lexa seems to notice it too, because her eyes drift down to Clarke’s lips, and the air between them is suddenly charged. 

Clarke isn’t sure whether she wants to punch Lexa or kiss her. 

Before she can act on either impulse Nyko opens the door, breaking the moment. Clarke springs back, but not before Nyko sees how close they’re standing. He raises an eyebrow but thankfully doesn’t say anything. 

“What do you want, Nyko?” Lexa asks. She smooths the front of her shirt, looking almost guilty.

He hands her a phone. “It’s Indra. The Russians just got the shipment.”

“It isn’t supposed to come in until next week,” she says, but he just shrugs. She takes the phone and listens for a minute, looking intent. “Okay. Is Gustus with you?...Call him and tell him to meet us there...Don’t let anyone out, I’ll be there as soon as I can.”

She’s already digging through a closet in the corner, pulling out various pieces of gear by the time she hangs up. She turns back to Nyko as she puts on a long coat Clarke recognizes from their fight last year. “Call Lincoln and tell him to meet us there. It’ll take me at least fifteen minutes to get there, so he has some time.”

Nyko nods and steps back out into the bar. Clarke moves to follow him, leaving Lexa to whatever mission Indra called her away for, but before she can, Lexa tosses something at her. 

She catches it easily, and it turns out to be a balled up black stocking cap.

“You should put your hair up. You don’t want to be recognized,” Lexa explains as she starts applying paint around her eyes. 

Clarke has no idea what that means. “Why would I worry about being recognized?”

“There’s a Russian gang in Brighton Beach that we’ve been watching for almost a month. They just got in a shipment of something highly illegal, probably guns and drugs, that they’re going to distribute throughout South Brooklyn if we don’t stop them.” Lexa looks at her expectantly, picking up on Clarke’s complete lack of comprehension. “Without Anya we’re going to be stretched thinner than I’d like.”

“Okay? What does that have to do with me?” She holds up the cap that’s still in her hands to illustrate her confusion. 

“Are you coming?” 

Clarke blinks in surprise. Of all the ways she’d expected this to go, being asked to help out with a Grounder mission hadn’t even occurred to her as a possibility. “I don’t think...I can’t.”

“Why not? We are working together, aren’t we?” Lexa’s tone is mild, but there’s an accusation underlying her words that puts Clarke on edge. 

“A minute ago you were telling me that you didn’t want to work together anymore and now you want me to help you?” It’s a deflection, and a weak one at that, but the prospect of helping the Grounders terrifies her. She doesn’t want to think about why. “And besides, it would be a PR nightmare.”

“I thought you were here because you wanted to be a hero,” Lexa says, turning away. “ I guess I misjudged you.” 

That hits too close for comfort. Lexa is giving her an opportunity to prove that she can be the hero everyone thinks she is. So why is she so afraid?

“It’s not that I don’t want to,” she says quietly, not looking at Lexa. “I just...if I go with you I can’t be Skygirl, and she’s the hero, not me.”

It’s the most honest she’s been with anyone in a long time. She’s not sure why she’s telling Lexa, but it feels like she understands, in a way that no one else really can. 

When Lexa speaks again her voice is soft. “Being Skygirl isn’t what makes you a hero, Clarke.”

Lexa is a study in contrast when Clarke finally looks at her. She’s never seen anyone look quite as fierce as Lexa in full gear, with her kevlar lined jacket, dark makeup smeared across her eyes, and the two sticks she fights with strapped across her back. But she’s looking at Clarke with such tenderness that Clarke almost believes her.

She swallows hard, wondering if she’s making a mistake, but unable to stop herself. “Okay...okay, I’ll do it.”

“Good.” Lexa smiles softly, and Clarke hopes she’s doing the right thing. “You’re welcome to any of our gear, but we need to get moving.”

Clarke tucks her hair up under the hat and grabs a leather jacket before following Lexa out to the alley behind the bar to where a motorcycle is waiting.

“It'll be faster if I fly us there,” she offers. 

“Is that wise? You don't want to be recognized.” 

Lexa has a point but it's already getting dark and Clarke has been flying around New York long enough to know that the odds of anyone noticing are slim. 

“You'd be surprised how rarely people look up in this city. And it's a lot faster than driving.” 

Lexa considers it for a moment before nodding. She hesitantly steps towards Clarke, obviously unsure of how to proceed. Clarke turns around and gestures at her back. “Hop on. Piggy back style.”

Lexa doesn't move. “Really? That's hardly dignified.”

“What did you expect? It's either that or I carry you bridal style. It's up to you.” Lexa eyes widen in what looks a lot like panic at Clarke’s suggestion, but only momentarily. She swallows, steeling herself, before putting her hands on Clarke’s shoulders. Lexa hoists herself up and Clarke takes a moment to appreciate the solid muscle of Lexa’s legs as she settles on her back. “Ready?”

“This is ridiculous,” Lexa huffs, and Clarke can’t help but laugh at how uncharacteristically cute Lexa’s objections are. Maybe this wasn’t such a bad idea after all.

She flies as high above the city as she dares: high enough to escape most people’s notice in the gathering dark, but well below the trajectories of the flights coming into and out of JFK. 

Clarke enjoys seeing the lights of the city pass below her. It’s freeing. Sometimes she wishes she could go back and have a normal life, but she can’t imagine not being able to fly. She could do without the rest of it, but nothing makes her feel more alive than the cool night air on her face and the city laid out below her.

Lexa doesn’t say anything except to give a couple of sparing directions once Clarke nears Brighton Beach, and the way her grip tightens around Clarke’s shoulders as they fly doesn’t escape her notice. 

Neither does the disapproving look Indra gives her when they meet her and Gustus on a rooftop overlooking an abandoned warehouse. Indra doesn’t comment, however, and Lexa doesn’t explain. 

A moment later Lincoln joins them, and Lexa turns to Indra. “Were you able to see what the shipment was?”

Indra shakes her head. “No. They unloaded the truck at the loading dock in the back, but I wasn’t able to get a good view of the cargo.”

“I don’t like that it came in early,” Gustus says. “It could be a trap.”

“Between Anya and I there’s no way they know we’re watching them,” Lincoln replies. “And besides, we’ve seen how unpredictable these guys are. I say the info’s good and it just came in early.”

Indra nods. “The truck came in just like Lincoln’s source said it would. Everything else checks out.”

Lexa considers it before speaking again. “Lincoln’s right. We go in now. We can’t risk whatever it is they just recieved hitting the streets. Gustus, Indra, take the front. Lincoln stay here and make sure no one gets out. Clarke and I will take the back. The usual plan.”

“I don’t like it. I still think it’s a trap.” Gustus looks directly at Clarke when he says it, and she doesn’t think he’s talking about the Russians.

“You always were overly cautious.” There’s a warning in Lexa’s voice that he doesn’t heed.

“And you always did have a weak spot.” 

Lexa works her jaw, but doesn’t say anything. When she does speak, it’s with an air of authority that Clarke has only seen flashes of before. “This is not the time for this discussion. We’re wasting time. Get in position. We have a job to do.”

Gustus doesn’t look happy, but he complies. They climb down from the roof and Clarke follows Lexa around the back of the warehouse to the loading dock. 

“What is the plan, exactly?” Clarke asks quietly as they take up position on either side of the loading door.

Lexa blinks in surprise, like it hadn’t even occurred to her that Clarke wouldn’t know the plan. “Gustus goes in first to draw their fire. We take down anyone who tries to come out this way, then we go in to help him and Indra. There shouldn’t be more than a couple dozen of them, and with the element of surprise on our side, we can go through them fairly easily.”

It’s simple. Exactly what Clarke would do. 

They wait in silence after that. Clarke fiddles with the zipper of her jacket, trying to distract herself, but Lexa is perfectly still except, Clarke notes, for the way she flexes her fingers on the grip of her sticks.

After a couple of minutes a loud bang sounds from inside, followed by a hail of gunfire. Clarke looks at Lexa who nods and shifts into a low stance, ready for a fight. 

They don’t have to wait long to get one. Thirty seconds later the door opens, and a small man runs outside, only to be met with one of Lexa’s sticks to the gut. He doubles over and Lexa hits him on the back of the head. He goes down, unconscious, and Lexa kicks away his gun.

Another man rushes through the door, gun drawn. Clarke surprises him from the side, grabbing the barrel and crushing it in her fist. She takes advantage of his momentary confusion to kick out his knee with enough force to dislocate it. He screams as he falls, and she moves on to the next guy, punching him in the face before stripping him of his gun and breaking it. He recovers long enough to take a swing at her, but she ducks below it, stunning him with a punch to the solar plexus. 

The guy whose leg she broke is still screaming, which attracts attention from inside, and someone starts shooting. She presses herself against the wall next to the door, and Lexa does the same on the other side once she finishes with the guy she’s fighting.

The shooting stops and a gun pokes through the door, followed by a large man. Lexa brings her stick down on his wrist, breaking it, and Clarke stomps on the gun when he drops it. He charges Lexa, who side steps him, redirecting his momentum so he charges over the edge of the loading dock. 

Clarke waits for another guy to come through the door, but no one does. She can still hear the sounds of fighting coming from within however, accompanied by the occasional gunshot. Lexa looks at her and jerks her head towards the door.

“Ready for round two?” 

Clarke takes a deep breath, trying to slow her heart rate, before nodding. “Can’t let the Gustus and Indra have all the fun, now can we?”

Lexa carefully looks through the door and when no one starts shooting at her, enters the warehouse. Clarke follows her, pulling the door closed behind her in case any of the guys outside recover enough to try their luck again.

The inside of the warehouse is mostly empty, except for stacks of wooden pallets near the walls, and twenty or so injured men littering the floor. There are still a handful a guys on their feet, but Gustus takes out three of them with a single punch and Indra finishes the last one off with a kick to the chest that sounds like it breaks a couple of ribs.

“Took you long enough,” Gustus says, kicking a guy who tries to get back up. 

“We had our hands full out back,” Lexa replies, surveying the scene. “And besides, it looks like you managed just fine.”

Indra grabs the nearest man and hauls him up by his collar. “Where’s the shipment?”

“I’m not telling you anything, bitch,” he says. 

“I would answer the lady if I were you,” Gustus says. “She only asks politely once.”

The guy spits in Indra’s face rather than answer. She drops him, twisting his body slightly so he falls on his clearly broken arm. He screams as Indra calmly wipes her face. “Where is the shipment?”

“A little pain isn’t going to get me to talk,” he grits out. “I did five years in a Russian prison. Pain is nothing to me.”

Indra kicks him, and he grunts, but true to his word he doesn’t talk. 

“Enough,” Lexa says after Indra kicks him again. “This is pointless. Gustus, go get Lincoln.”

Gustus returns with Lincoln a minute later. He squats down next to the man. “I would suggest relaxing. It’ll make this easier for both of us.”

“Fuck you.” 

Lincoln shrugs and grabs the guy’s face. After a couple of seconds the man’s eyes roll back in his head and he slumps back, unconscious. Lincoln looks up, disgusted. He goes to the nearest stack of pallets and pushes it aside to reveal a door. “Down here.”

Gustus breaks the padlock and hauls open the door and leads the way down the stairs behind it. 

“All clear,” he call up after a minute, and the rest follow him down into a cramped basement. 

“Shit.” Clarke is expecting guns or drugs, or hell, even exotic animals, but not the dozen or so young women cowering against the far wall. 

“They’re the shipment,” Lincoln confirms. 

Lexa kneels down in front of a girl who can’t be older than twelve. 

“We’re here to help. To let you go,” Lexa says gently, but the girl doesn’t look like she understands. “Do you speak English?”

She repeats herself in Spanish when the girl continues to look at her blankly. Eventually one of the other women speaks haltingly. “No English, only Russian.”

Lexa sits back on her heels, never looking away from the women. “Call it in. We’re done here.”

Indra, Gustus, and Lincoln head back upstairs, but Clarke stays put. “We can’t just leave them here.”

Lexa turns to her. “There’s nothing more we can do to help them. We’ll call the authorities and make sure they get here, but we don’t have the resources to do anything for them beyond that.”

Clarke knows that Lexa is right, that there’s nothing they can do for these women except for making sure the proper authorities find them, but she hates to have to leave them behind. It breaks her heart. 

“Police are almost here,” Gustus calls down eventually, and Lexa stands, expression unreadable. 

Clarke follows her upstairs, to where the rest of the group is finishing cleaning up the scene. They’ve dragged the guys in from the loading dock and taped up and gagged the ones that are conscious. The biohazard symbol has been painted on the wall, and all the unbroken guns are piled in the corner. 

She can hear the approaching police sirens as they retreat out the back. The group disperses, but Lexa stays, watching the police enter the warehouse from the rooftop across the street.

“Go home, Clarke,” she says when Clarke follows her to the roof.

“And leave you to what? Uber home?” Lexa gives her a blank look when Clarke laughs at the image of Lexa in full battle gear trying to hail a cab. “I’m your ride, remember?”

Lexa doesn’t say anything, turning back to watch the police escort out the men they’d left for them. Clarke wonders why she’s sticking around to watch, until she notices how Lexa visibly relaxes when the first of the women is brought out and put in an ambulance. Lexa cares, even if she pretends she doesn’t. 

Lexa’s quiet until they get back to the bar. “Thank you.”

Clarke shrugs, handing back the jacket and hat she borrowed. “No problem. It was fun.”

And it had been. It’s been long enough since she’s gotten to bust some heads that she’d forgotten the thrill of the adrenaline rush that comes with a good fight.

Lexa gives her a serious look as she takes off her jacket and starts to remove her gear. “It shouldn’t be.”

“Why not? With all the shit we see doing this job I think it’s okay to enjoy beating up bad guys every once in while.”

“This job isn’t about fun. It’s about justice, and doing what’s right,” Lexa says. “And besides, it’s dangerous. Fun promotes carelessness.”

Clarke shakes her head, wondering, not for the first time, what happened to make Lexa so serious about everything. “You’re allowed to enjoy yourself, you know. This job, this life, is hard enough as it is. It’s okay to be a little bit careless sometimes.”

Lexa gives her a long look, her expression softening. Once again there’s so much tenderness in her eyes that Clarke isn’t sure what to think. She can’t get a handle on their relationship. One moment they’re arguing and the next Lexa is looking at her as if she’s the only person in the world. And Clarke doesn’t want her to ever look away. 

Suddenly Lexa leans in and kisses Clarke softly. She stands there frozen for a moment, dumbfounded. Lexa starts to pull back, reading Clarke’s lack of reaction as rejection, and Clarke realizes that she doesn't want this to stop, so she leans into it, fisting her hand in Lexa’s hair and pulling her back. 

Clarke shivers as Lexa’s hands ghost down her sides, settling on her hips. Kissing Lexa is softer and more gentle than she would have imagined, without any of the urgency she’s used to. She’s pretty sure she could go on kissing Lexa forever. 

Her stomach drops at the realization that she’s kissing Lexa. Lexa, who is the leader of the Grounders. Lexa, who all her friends hate even if they won’t say it. Lexa, who was responsible for Finn’s death. 

She pulls away, taking a step back, breathing heavily. “I’m sorry. I can’t...I just...I can’t.”

There’s confusion in Lexa’s eyes but she doesn’t say anything. She just nods, swallowing hard. Clarke turns on her heel and leaves, trying not to run out of the bar. Once she’s outside she takes a deep breath, trying to force down the guilt that is threatening to overwhelm her. 

Maybe Bellamy was right and she’s betraying everything and everyone she loves. But if that’s the case, why does it feel like the only person she’s hurting is Lexa?


	6. Chapter 6

Clarke spends the weekend doing her best to forget about the Grounders. Without anything to occupy her time and distract her, however, she’s less than successful.

She tells herself that working with the Grounders was a bad idea, that there’s no way her plan would have ever worked, that Lexa is cold and heartless and never had any intention of helping her, that Bellamy was right. But the more she repeats it, the less she believes it.

The truth is that working with the Grounders had made her feel more alive, more herself, than she has in a very long time. Fighting beside Lexa had felt right. Comfortable. In a way that she’s only ever felt fighting with Octavia, and even then only after nearly a year of working together. 

She doesn’t want to think about what that means though. That or the kiss.

God that kiss. Every time she closes her eyes she relives it. But it can’t happen. Not again anyways. So she tries to ignore it. Pretend like it never happened. It’s not like she’s ever going to work with Lexa again. Lexa had made that abundantly clear. And even if she hadn’t, Clarke is sure she wouldn’t want to work together again after Clarke practically ran away from her after they kissed.

And it works, sort of. She manages to convince herself that she doesn’t want to see Lexa again, and that she never felt anything between them. If she doesn’t think too hard about it, she even manages to believe it. 

That is, until Raven calls. 

“Where are you?” The question isn’t usually how Raven opens conversations, which is concerning in and of itself.

“Out walking Allie, why?”

There’s a rustling on the line that sounds like Raven moving around her office. “I finally broke into the Mountain’s internal network, and Clarke, it’s worse than we thought.”

For a moment Clarke feels vindicated for being right. For pushing for this when no one believed her. But the feeling is quickly overtaken by the realization that this means she’s going to have to see Lexa again. And she doesn’t know if that’s a good thing or not. 

“Shit. Um, okay.” Her mind runs a mile a minute, sorting through options, trying to figure out the best way to proceed. It’s already late October so they don’t have much time before the Canadian Rockies are inaccessible for the winter. “I’ll come in right away.”

“Don’t bother. I’ll come to you. Kane is already suspicious of what I’ve been doing lately.” The line goes quiet and when Raven speaks again she sounds determined. “Actually, we should include the Grounders. I’ll grab Octavia and we’ll meet you at their bar.”

“Are you sure?” Clarke asks. “You can just give me the info and I can relay in onto Lexa if you’d prefer.”

“No, it’s fine,” Raven says. “I have complete network access, but I don’t know how long it’s going to last. I’m downloading everything I can, but there’s no guarantee that I’m going to be able to get everything before they realize they’ve been breached.”

The determination in Raven’s voice tells her everything she needs to know. “Okay. I’ll meet you guys there. And give Bellamy and the others a heads up about what’s going on. It sounds like we’re going to have to move fast on this, so we should keep them in the loop.”

“Already done. I’m three steps ahead of you, as usual, Griffin.” Clarke can practically hear Raven’s smirk. 

“Yeah yeah, you’re a genius.” Clarke rolls her eyes, but she can’t keep the laugh out of her voice.

“Damn right I am.” 

Clarke heads back to her apartment to drop off Allie, who gives her a curious look when Clarke opens the door to her building. Without work, Clarke’s gotten into the habit of taking Allie out for long walks through Brooklyn, making today’s abbreviated route unusual. 

“Sorry, girl,” Clarke says, scratching Allie’s ears as she unclips her leash. “Important things to do. I promise I’ll take you to the dog park tomorrow to make up for it.”

Allie watches her as she leaves, whining softly. Clarke feels bad, as she always does when she has to leave her dog home alone, but as much as she’d like to pretend like none of this is happening, she has a job to do.

A week ago she would have been excited to see Lexa again, especially because she was bringing good news, but now all she feels is anxiety. The prospect of seeing Lexa is both exciting and terrifying, and while Clarke is pretty sure she knows why, she really doesn’t want to think about it. Focusing on the job at hand is easier than admitting that she might be falling for the leader of the Grounders.

She waits for Raven and Octavia outside of the bar, not wanting to go in by herself. It’s childish, she knows, but she’s not sure she can face Lexa alone. Octavia gives her a curious look when she sees Clarke waiting for them, but thankfully she doesn’t say anything. 

For the first time the Grounders don’t regard them with suspicion when they enter the bar, and she swears a hint of smile crosses Lexa’s face before she schools her expression into her customary blank look when Octavia and Raven follow Clarke in. Clarke leads the way to the back room, and if anyone is put off by her presumptuousness no one says anything. 

Once they’re out of the bar and away from any prying ears, Clarke turns to Lexa and the assembled Grounders. “We did it. Or, well, Raven did it. She broke into the Mountain’s network. We have the access we need now.”

Raven sits down at the computer and plugs in her laptop. “I have complete network access, including all of their intake files and experimental data. I’ve taken care to cover my tracks but I don’t know how long it’s going to take them to realize I’ve broken their encryption, so we have a limited amount of time.”

“Experimental data?” Lincoln asks, looking uncomfortable.

“Yeah, that’s the bad news. Or, part of the bad news, because, trust me, there’s really no good news here. From what I can tell, they’re experimenting on powered people, trying to find a way to get rid of people’s powers.”

“We’ve encountered groups like that before,” Indra says. “They’re always cranks and snake oil salesmen playing on people’s prejudices.”

Clarke has heard the stories that pop up occasionally of people who claim to be able to “cure” people of their powers. But they’re always treated with the same regard as the preachers who claim to be able to make you straight by casting out your demons: distasteful and bigoted, but not effective. 

“Well these guys seem like they could actually do it. We already knew about their ability to suppress powers at short range, but their latest reports suggest that they’re close to a breakthrough,” Raven explains.

“Who are they?” Clarke says, asking the question on everyone’s mind. 

“They call themselves The Society for the Preservation of Mankind, and they seem to be some sort of fringe anti-powers group. They’re small but well funded, run by some old billionaire named Dante Wallace.” Raven pulls up a picture of a harmless looking older man. “I couldn’t find much about him. Seems to be a real secretive type. I was able to find more about his chief scientist, Dr. Lorelai Tsing.”

Another pictures flashes onto the screen, this time of a dark skinned middle aged woman. “She got her medical degree from McGill and published a couple of controversial papers about the physiology of inborn powers before she dropped off the radar a couple of years ago, when she was recruited by Wallace to continue her less savory work.”

“I remember her papers,” Nyko says. “She suggested that inborn powers were the result of damaging mutations that would eventually destroy humanity. They’re still popular in certain circles.”

Gustus grunts and spits, showing just what he thinks of those circles, and Clarke can’t blame him. Powered people aren’t exactly popular in most places, and those with inborn abilities get the worst of it. She’s been isolated from it for the most part, being as high profile as she is, but the Grounders haven’t been so lucky. 

“How many people are we dealing with?” Lexa looks determined now, and a small part of Clarke is glad that what the Mountain is doing is bad enough to get Lexa to commit to helping her. A very small part, because Raven was right, it’s worse than she imagined, and she had been there. 

“About fifteen civilians between the admin and lab staff, and then an additional hundred or so guards, all former military, lead by the creepily named Cage Wallace, Dante Wallace’s son.” Raven pulls up a roster of faces, some of whom seem familiar to Clarke. “They currently have 35 prisoners, from all over the world, including your girl Anya. These guys are well trained and good enough at what they do to kidnap superheroes.”

“So we’ll be outnumbered ten to one without powers,” Lincoln says, looking around at the assembled group. “I don’t like those odds.”

“We’ve faced worse and won.” Octavia cracks her knuckles, and Clarke admires her optimism.

“We’re going to need to figure out a way to prevent them from suppressing our powers, because there’s no way we’re getting in otherwise,” Clarke says, remembering how impenetrable the Mountain had looked from outside. She turns to Raven, “Can you shut off however they’re doing it remotely? And how are they doing that, anyways?”

“From what I can tell, it looks like they’ve found a frequency that resonates with the human body and suppresses powers. I can shut it off from here, but they’ll just turn it back on. You need to destroy the transmitter if you want to take it offline permanently,” Raven explains.

Clarke runs her hand through her hair in frustration. She knew this was going to be difficult, but the Mountain’s entire set up seems specifically designed to thwart her. Which, she supposes, it probably is. 

“And, the other bad news is that the latest weather reports are predicting a major snow storm to hit the area and close the mountains at the end of the week, so it’s now or never,” Raven says, sounding apologetic.

Clarke sighs and pulls out her phone to call Bellamy. It looks like they have a long night ahead of them.

***

The next twenty four hours are a blur. They spend the night planning and making arrangements. By morning they have a workable plan and by noon they’re on a flight from JFK to Whitehorse, Canada, by way of Juneau. 

She spends the flight going over the plan with Bellamy and Lexa, coming up with backups and contingencies, although after a while it starts to feel like they’re trying to convince themselves that it’s going to work more than anything. 

They buy gear and rent Jeeps in Whitehorse and start the long drive into the mountains. Clarke finds herself riding shotgun to Lexa, while Monty and Lincoln doze in the back seat. She’s too wired to sleep though, so she stares out the window as they drive. The early morning light is muted by a damp grey fog that hangs heavy over the mountains, obscuring their peaks. It would almost be pretty, in a depressing sort of way, if not for the knowledge of what one of these mountains is hiding. 

They drive in silence, which suits Clarke just fine. In the whirl of planning and travel of the last day and a half she was able to forget about the tension between her and Lexa, or at least, distract herself from it. But now they’re alone, or as alone as you can be with two of your teammates asleep in the car, and Clarke can’t help but think about what happened the last time they were alone. But this isn’t the time for that, so she continues to stare out the window in silence.

“I’m sorry.” Lexa’s voice is quiet, barely audible above the hum of the car engine, but it’s enough to startle Clarke out of her reverie. 

“For what?” Clarke asks, just as quietly. She’s not sure what conversation they’re about to have, but whatever it is, she can tell that it’s not something they want to wake Lincoln and Monty for. 

Lexa considers what she’s going to say for a moment, never taking her eyes off the road. “For your friend, last year. I didn’t mean for him to die.”

Of all the things that she was expecting Lexa to say, that was definitely not one of them. She closes her eyes, taking a deep breath. Instantly she’s back on that rooftop. She can still picture it like it was yesterday. 

_ The plan was simple: feed the Grounders bad intel, ambush them, arrest them for operating as super powered vigilantes without a license. They would put up a fight, but as long as everyone stuck to the plan it shouldn’t be any more difficult than any other super group they had fought.  _

_ And at first it worked. Bellamy lit up Gustus, keeping him occupied from a distance by pinning him down with bursts of flames. Octavia got the drop on Indra, keeping her away from where Monty and Jasper were rounding up Lincoln and Nyko. _

_ Clarke went looking for Lexa, who she lost in the quickly developing chaos. She landed on a nearby rooftop, surveying the scene and trying to find her mark. She noticed that Finn, who was supposed to be using his telepathy to find and neutralize Anya, had also lost his target, but before she can do anything else, she spotted Lexa coming up behind Octavia.  _

_ “O, behind you!” She called, hoping that Octavia heard her over the din.  _

_ It was Finn who heard her warning, though. He ran towards Lexa. Clarke tried to call him off, because he wasn’t a fighter, not really, but before she could, something closed around her throat. _

_ She clawed at her neck, feeling an arm that wasn’t there. She threw her elbow back and heard a grunt as she made contact. The pressure on her neck let up and a form flickered into sight in her peripheral vision. She turned, but before she could locate Anya she was gone.  _

_ She hated invisibility.  _

_ She was pretty sure she had gotten Anya in the solar plexus, so she should still be in front of her. But before she could strike, the building shook beneath her, knocking her off balance. She spun around, checking on the situation below. _

_ A jolt of pain shot through her leg as Anya kicked her knee out. She fell, and the building shook again. She couldn’t see what was shaking the building, but the momentum of the fight had obviously shifted towards the Grounders.  _

_ Indra was dodging Bellamy’s flames easily, keeping him distracted. The shaking building could only mean that Gustus and Octavia were having it out; no one else was strong enough to do that. And Finn was somewhat futilely trying to keep Lexa out of the fight. _

_ Lexa turned away from Finn, going to aid Lincoln and Nyko, but he charged her. Clarke tried to get up, or to call out to get someone else to help him, because there was no way he was going to win one on one against Lexa, but Anya took advantage of her distraction, pinning her down. Clarke tried to use her sheer strength to dislodge her, but Anya had leverage on her, and Clarke still couldn’t see her.  _

_ Below them, Lexa saw Finn coming and turned, pivoting into a well placed side kick that threw Finn back into the wall. He disappeared from Clarke’s line of sight.  _

_ The building shook again, and the roof started to pitch beneath her. That was enough to cause Anya to lose her grip, and Clarke was able to dislodge her, but it didn’t matter. The roof fell away below her, and she launched herself into the air, grabbing a now visible Anya on her way up.  _

_ She landed on the next roof over, watching as the corner of the building they had just been on continued to fall. The rest of the Grounders were already scattering, the fight clearly over. Anya gave her a strange look when she released her, like she wasn’t sure if they were going to keep fighting or not.  _

_ “Just go,” Clarke said. Anya didn’t need to be told twice. _

_ She looked around, heart sinking as she realized she couldn’t find Finn. He had been directly under the section of wall that had collapsed. She started digging through the rubble before the dust had even settled.  _

_ It didn’t take long to find him.  _

_ Eventually Octavia and Bellamy pulled her away, gently leading her towards the car that Kane had shown up in at some point. She thought, just for a moment before they pushed her into the backseat, that she saw Lexa, watching them from a fire escape down the street, but when she looked again it was empty.  _

“You cared about him.” Lexa’s voice pulls Clarke out of the memory she’d rather not relive, but can’t ever seem to escape. 

“I loved him.” 

She expects there to be pity or sympathy or something else she’s seen a million times in Lexa’s eyes, but instead she finds something like understanding when she finally looks at her. She wonders if Lexa really does understand.

Lexa looks back at the road, flexing her fingers on the steering wheel. When she speaks again it’s in a halting, quiet voice. “I lost someone I loved to this life too, a long time ago. I lead us into a trap and she died because of it. Because of me.”

Clarke thinks about Finn. About how he should never have been in a position to try and fight Lexa in the first place. About how if she had just done her job he would still be alive. 

“How did you deal with the guilt?” It’s an honest question. She’s spent the past year going over all the ways she could have saved him, but it never makes her feel better. 

“I learned from it. Love, personal attachment, it gets in the way of doing the job,” Lexa says, giving Clarke a sidelong look.

She says it like it’s the most obvious thing in the world, but Clarke can’t accept it. She can’t live her life that way. “I disagree. You can’t live this life without love. It’s why we do it.”

“I love my people, I love the city and my team and people I protect, but if I let myself love someone beyond that, I leave myself open, vulnerable.” Lexa swallows hard and Clarke wonders just how bad her loss must have been to make her completely shut out even the possibility of love. “Why do you think the vast majority of the people who do this job wear masks?”

“Because it’s illegal probably,” Clarke says, unable to keep the sarcasm out of her voice. 

Lexa rolls her eyes. “Yes, but also to protect their loved ones, because they know it’s a weakness. Better to just not love anyone, than to leave yourself open to attack.”

“That must be lonely.”

“It is necessary.”

Clarke’s heart breaks for Lexa, for this girl who thinks that love is weakness and being a hero means forgoing it completely. Clarke wants more than anything to show Lexa that she doesn’t have to live that way. That love can be strength, if she just lets someone in. 

They pass the rest of the drive in silence. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A wild backstory appears!
> 
> Also, it might be a little while before I can get the next chapter out because I have my qualifying exam coming up and need to focus on like, not failing out of grad school, so
> 
> But, I've pretty much planned the entire back half of this story out, so don't fret, it'll come around eventually


	7. Chapter 7

The plan is simple:

Bellamy and Lincoln break into the compound disguised as guards. Bellamy shuts off the power suppressor while Lincoln frees the prisoners. Jasper’s waiting near the entrance for his powers to come back, which is the signal that Bellamy’s succeeded. Once the suppressor goes, Clarke will take a team in through the exhaust exchange she had previously escaped from while Gustus and Octavia take out the front door. 

Once they get inside they’ll meet up with Bellamy and Lincoln to get the prisoners out. Hopefully at least some of them will be strong enough to fight their way out. Indra, Nyko, and Jasper will ferry the prisoners to the nearby town while the rest of them go after Tsing and Wallace. 

They’ll be fighting the clock with the snowstorm that’s supposed to close the mountains, and Clarke knows from experience that anything they have planned will go out the window once they get inside, but having the plan makes her feel better. Slightly.

Clarke is all too aware that this isn’t just about rescuing people anymore. It’s about saving the world from Tsing, and that makes it so much worse. Because now failure isn’t an option. 

Clarke and Lexa spent a long time discussing what to do about Tsing. Lexa had advocated for reporting her to the Canadian authorities and letting them deal with it, but Clarke knows better. She’s been a government operative for too long to believe that any government that gets it’s hands on her and her work won’t use it. And even if they don’t, once it’s out there, anyone could use it. It’s better if it just ceases to exist. 

As distasteful as it is, they decided that having Lincoln wipe her memory while Monty destroys her data is the only way to prevent her from starting over again. She’s too dangerous to allow to continue.

Clarke knows the plan like the back of her hand at this point. She’s gone over it so many times that she’s pretty sure she can recite it in her sleep. And yet she still finds herself going over it again while they wait for the signal from Jasper. 

Call it nerves, or just needing something to take her mind off the waiting. Off all the possible ways it could go wrong. 

“Stop,” Lexa says, like she knows exactly what Clarke is thinking. Clarke hadn’t heard her come over to where she’s standing, looking at the mountain as if it would give up its secrets if only she stared at it long enough. “There’s nothing more you can do now. All we can do is wait.”

Clarke knows that Lexa is right, but she’s never been good at doing nothing. And besides, things are already not going to plan. “It’s been nearly two hours. It shouldn’t be taking them this long.”

“You trust your people?”

Clarke nods, because there’s no one she trusts more than Bellamy with this. 

“Then they’ll come through. These things take time.” 

There it is again, that frustrating way Lexa has of stating things as obvious facts. Granted, she was just stating facts, and obvious ones at that, but it doesn’t stop Clarke from wanting to punch her. 

Okay, maybe she doesn’t actually want to punch her, unless you go with the loosest possible definition of punching, but this isn’t the time or the place for that.

“It’s amazing how that works,” Clarke says, rolling her eyes to cover up her suddenly very intense desire to challenge Lexa. 

“Don’t be clever, Clarke. It’s unbecoming.” 

“Your face is unbecoming.” 

Clarke winces inwardly at how bad that was. Lexa cocks her head, raising her eyebrow and Clarke feels herself turn red. “I mean, it’s not, actually. Your face is very becoming. Your entire body is...becoming...”

Smooth. 

She’s suddenly very glad that the rest of the group is gathered over by the cars, well out of earshot. Octavia would never let her live that down. 

Any relief she might have felt disappears when Jasper appears at her elbow. “Wow, did I hear that right, Griffin? Did you just turn a first grade insult into the most awkward line possible?”

She rounds on him, pretending not to notice the slightly flustered look on Lexa’s face. “It would be in your best interest to put that super speed of yours to good use right about now and run away.”

He laughs and gives her a lazy salute. “I would, boss, but seeing as I’m here to tell you that the suppressors are down and we’re good to go, I feel like that would only make you hate me more.”

“Noted. Go tell the others, smartass.”

Jasper grins and runs off, leaving a trail of dust in his wake.

“Ready?” Lexa asks as Clarke adjusts her comm. 

The question is soft and Clarke is struck by how much tenderness is in Lexa’s eyes. She knows first hand not to take these types of moments for granted. Plans break. People die.

She shakes off her ghosts and decides not to waste this. Not this time. 

She grabs Lexa’s jacket and pulls her in for a kiss. It’s everything their first kiss wasn’t: quick and hard and over too soon, but it’s enough.

“Now I am.”

***

Ten minutes later Clarke is once again stuffed into a ventilation shaft, this time with Monty, Jasper, Indra, and Lexa. Needless to say, it’s a little bit cramped. She’s really beginning to hate ventilation shafts.

She taps on her comm, giving Octavia and Gustus the signal to start their assault on the main entrance. She has no idea if they’ll actually be able to get through that way, but it should serve as enough of a distraction to let the rest of them get a head start. And Monty can open the door for them if they can’t get through. 

Clarke takes a deep breath, steadying herself. This is it. There’s no going back now. A few seconds later an alarm starts blaring. She takes that as her signal to go and kicks out a vent cover and dropping down into the hall.

“You good?” Clarke asks Monty, who sticks his head out of the shaft after Indra and Lexa follow her down. He and Jasper are going to continue to follow the vents to the control room where Monty can access their system and start deleting data.

He nods and gives her a thumbs up. “You?”

“You know it.” She smiles, trying to project confidence she doesn’t feel. “Now get going. We have a world to save.”

He gives her a small smile and disappears. She replaces the vent cover and hurries down the hall to where Indra and Lexa are waiting. 

Lexa puts out a hand, stopping Clarke from charging around the corner. She shoots Lexa a questioning look, but Lexa just shakes her head. After a moment Clarke hears it: the pounding of boots as several guards come charging down the hall, headed towards the alarm. 

They press themselves against the wall, hoping that the guards don’t notice them. 

Thankfully the guards pass without checking the corridor they’re in, and Clarke lets out a breath she didn’t realize she’d been holding. 

Lexa holds them back for a couple more seconds before nodding and pointing back the way the guards had come. Lexa leads the way down the hall and Clarke takes up the rear. 

The compound is a maze of identical corridors and even though Clarke memorized the floor plan on the plane she still gets a little turned around. But Lexa doesn’t hesitate and they soon find where Lincoln is unlocking cells as quickly as he can.

He’s made it through about half of them, but it’s slow going given that he has to unlock each with a different key from the large keyring he took from a guard. When he sees them he pulls another set of keys from his pocket and tosses it at Lexa, who gets to work on the doors on the other side of the hall.

“Bellamy?” Clarke asks when she doesn’t see him. Bellamy and Lincoln hadn’t worn comms in because it was deemed too risky, and Clarke doesn’t like not being able to contact members of her team. She knows it’s probably fine, but she’s already worried about how long it took for them to take down the suppressors, and not seeing him here has her on edge. 

“He went back to meet your guys in the control room,” Lincoln says without looking up. 

It makes sense, and it was probably a good decision on his part, especially because Clarke’s already somewhat worried about leaving Monty and Jasper without backup, but it leaves her feeling exposed. Any deviation from the plan leaves them open in ways they’re not expecting.

Clarke puts it out of her mind and starts checking the rooms that Lincoln already opened, assuring the people she finds that they are indeed there to rescue them. She points the ones who are capable of joining the fight to Indra, but it’s not enough. Too many of the prisoners are too weak to run, let alone fight. 

Clarke surveys the motley crew of prisoners they've assembled. Most of them are pale and drawn and several are leaning on each other for support. They're never going to be able to fight their way out. 

“Status?” She asks over comms, hoping that someone will have good news. 

“We’re getting nowhere out here,” Octavia says over a hail of gunfire. 

“Sorry about that,” Monty puts in. “I thought I’d be able to open the door from here but it looks like it has to be opened manually.” 

“My fault,” Raven chips in from where she’s monitoring the operation from New York, “the network makes it look like there’s a way to open the door, but it’s just a dead end subroutine. I should have caught that.”

Clarke sighs in frustration. This is not how this is supposed to go. “So what I’m hearing is that we need to open the door ourselves, from the inside.”

“Pretty much,” Monty says.

“Have you freed the prisoners yet?” Bellamy asks over Monty’s line.

“Most of them, but they’re in worse shape than we hoped. There’s no way we’re going to be able to lead an all out assault on the front door.”

“The goon squad still hasn’t figured out that you used the ventilation exchange to get in,” Raven says. “You should be able to get them out that way without much difficulty.”

That has already occurred to Clarke, but it isn’t ideal. It means she’s going to have to ferry them down to the ground one at a time, which is going to be risky. And slow. 

“She’s right,” Lexa says. Clarke starts, confused, before she remembers that the Grounders are on comms as well, and can hear everything they’re saying.

Lexa and Indra come over to where she’s standing, followed by a bedraggled looking Anya, who nods at Clarke. 

“Alright,” Clarke says, “Jasper, help us with the prisoners. Bellamy, Monty, stick to the plan and try and isolate the civilians so we can deal with that once we get the prisoners out.”

“Work fast,” Nyko says, from where he’s stationed outside. “The weather doesn’t look like it’s going to hold for much longer.”

Lexa exchanges a significant look with Indra, but before Clarke can think about what it might mean Jasper shows up. With his help it only takes them about a minute to get everyone to exhaust exchange room. And they don’t even have to take the vents this time because they have the keys.

Flying the prisoners down is slower work than she’d like, because she has to take them one at the time. She leaves them with Nyko, who starts healing the ones who need it. He was right about the weather: the clouds are thick and heavy and it looks like it’s going to start snowing any minute. 

She finishes with the prisoners and is just about to bring Jasper down to help Nyko take them into town when Raven’s voice comes over the comm. “Heads up, you’ve got a whole bunch of guards incoming.”

“Shit. How did they find us?”

“Turns out they’re smarter than they look and they finally realized that we were just the distraction,” Octavia says.

Clarke assesses the situation: Jasper went back to help Monty and Bellamy already, leaving just Indra, Lexa, and Lincoln with her. Lincoln’s supposed to join the others in the control room, but he’s not gonna get through the guards on his own. 

Lexa and Indra set themselves for a fight, but before they can do anything more than that the guards are on them.

“Get out of here, we’ll hold them off,” Lexa says, smashing one of her sticks into a guard's face. 

“I’m not leaving you here.” Clarke pulls a gun out of the next guard’s hands and smashes his face in with it. 

“We don’t have time for this,” Indra says, “Just go.”

She’s right and Clarke knows it. But even Indra and Lexa don’t stand much of a chance against fifteen guards with guns, especially with nothing at their backs but open air. This is not the hill to die on today. Not yet anyways. 

She throws caution to the wind and decides to blow up the plan. It’s pretty dead already, all things considered. 

“Hey Lincoln, do you trust me?” She side steps a guard who he punches in the gut.

“No.” She gives him points for honesty if nothing else.

“Too bad.” 

She spins and kicks him in the back, pushing him out into open air. Before he can even register what’s happening, she grabs the collar of Lexa’s coat and barrels into Indra, grabbing her waist and pulling them out after Lincoln.

She speeds up as she falls, catching up with Lincoln, who at least had enough sense to spread out to slow his descent. She wraps her legs around him and starts to try and slow them down so they can actually land. 

Three people is a lot, and she can’t bring them down as smoothly as she’d like. Which means that they end up crashing into the river. Thank god for the river. It’s saved her twice now. 

“A warning would be nice next time,” Lexa says as they drag themselves onto the bank. 

Clarke just shrugs. The movement makes her shoulder hurt, and she looks down to find that her sleeve is torn and a bruise is developing. One of the guard’s bullets must have clipped her during the fight. She’s really starting to hate this place.

They make their way over to where Nyko is waiting with the prisoners. Octavia and Gustus are with him, looking more than a little worse for wear. 

The weather hasn’t improved, and the first flurries of snow are starting to fall. They are officially out of time.

Lincoln and Nyko start the load the prisoners into the cars, getting ready to take them to town. They can ride out the storm there while the rest of them regroup for their final assault on the Mountain.

“We got everyone out,” she says over the com. “How’s it going inside?”

“Could be better.” Jasper sounds strained. 

“What does that mean?” Octavia asks, concerned.

“It means that the guards found us, and we’ve had to barricade ourselves in the control room,” Bellamy says. 

“Just hold tight,” Clarke says. “We’ll be there as soon as we can.”

“Soon would be good,” Jasper says and Bellamy grunts in agreement.

Clarke goes to find Lexa, who’s having a hushed discussion with Indra and Gustus by the cars. 

They stop when Clarke approaches.

“I assume you heard all of that,” Clarke says, trying to ignore the sudden tension between the two groups. “Any ideas for getting back in or are we just going to go with the punch everything approach?”

Lexa gives Indra a sidelong look before she squares her shoulders and turns to face Clarke. “We’re not going back in.”

Clarke isn’t sure she understands at first. “What do you mean? We still have to take out Tsing and Wallace. Not to mention that half my team is still in there.”

“The storm is coming in too fast. If we don’t leave now we’re going to be trapped by the snow.”

“As long as we get back in we can ride out the storm in the facility and call for evac once it passes. It’s not like we’re going to die of exposure.” Clarke isn’t sure where this is coming from. It’s not like they don’t have options. Sure, this wasn’t in the plan, but it was always a possibility.

“And what then? You might be able to survive an international incident but we can’t.” Lexa shakes her head, like she can’t believe how naive Clarke is being. “If my team is still here when the authorities arrive we’ll be arrested. We’re illegal Clarke.”

“We’ll keep that from happening. I’ll keep it from happening.”

Lexa gives her a sad look. “Do you really believe that?”

That stings. She had thought that Lexa trusted her, but apparently not. 

Lexa’s clearly made up her mind, but Clarke has to try. Even if her people weren’t trapped there’s too much at stake to give up now. This wasn’t a rescue mission anymore. 

“What about stopping Tsing? If we don’t stop her now we’re never going to, and once her cure is out there there’s going to be nothing we can do.” She is not begging Lexa to stay. That she knows for sure. But she can’t help feel like she is.

“Survival is more important. We can’t help anyone if we’re dead or in prison. We got these people out. That has to be enough for now.” 

She’s right, but it doesn’t matter. Clarke would rather freeze to death in the snow than abandon her people, or the world, because those are the stakes, even if Lexa refuses to admit it. “So you’re just going to leave us here to die?”

It comes out angrier than she intends it, but Lexa doesn’t blink in the face of the accusation. “You and Octavia are welcome to come with us.”

“Like hell we will,” Octavia spits. “There’s no way I’m leaving without my brother.”

Lexa gives Clarke a long look. “I’m sorry Clarke. I’m just trying to do what’s best for my people.”

“Fuck you, Lexa.” 

It’s not much of a response, but it’s all Clarke can muster. Lexa just turns around and joins her teammates in the cars. She doesn’t look back as they drive away.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So this one took longer than I would have liked because of life, and the summer, and it just being more difficult to coordinate because of all the moving pieces. I have no claims to knowing anything about battle or strategy or anything except what I've learned from comic books, so there's that.
> 
> This chapter is also unbeta'ed because tumblingforth, my lovely beta, started grad school so, any mistakes are mine. 
> 
> The next one won't be nearly as long of a wait I think though, so you won't have to stew on this cliff hanger for too long (hopefully).


	8. Chapter 8

The snow is falling in earnest now. Big, wet flakes that make the woods seem eerily quiet. 

Clarke stares at the spot on the road where the cars disappeared from sight. A part of her can’t believe that Lexa is gone. Mostly though, she just can’t believe that Lexa would do that to her. She thought they had something, some sort of understanding at the very least. But apparently not.

Clarke doesn’t know how to feel. Mostly she just feels blank. But anger and sadness and something suspiciously like heartbreak are all threatening to overtake the shock that is numbing her mind, making it hard to think. 

She doesn’t have time to figure it out though, or to wallow in self pity, because the mission isn’t over. Her people are still inside and if she doesn’t want to freeze to death she needs to get there too. 

“What a bitch,” Raven says eventually, breaking the silence. Clarke realizes that the comms are open and everyone heard what happened. It doesn’t make her feel better. 

She takes a deep breath, pushing everything aside but the task at hand. It’s not the first time she’s had to turn her heart to stone to complete a mission. Usually the stakes aren’t quite so high and her heart isn’t quite so broken but it’s all the same in principle. That’s what she tells herself at least.

Clarke turns to Octavia, who’s pacing angrily. She swallows thickly, hoping her voice doesn’t betray her. “Alright. We have to get back in. Any ideas?”

Octavia gives her a dark look. “Punch everything.”

***

Several men with very large guns waiting for them at the exhaust exchange, but it doesn’t matter. Octavia is bulletproof and and Clarke is very tired of being shot at. 

They find the control room under siege by at least thirty guards. Normally being outnumbered by that much would worry Clarke, but right now Clarke really doesn’t care all that much. And besides, there are very few things that can stop a pissed off Octavia. 

Turns out that punching a bunch of guys is very cathartic, and by the time they clear the hallway enough for Bellamy to let them into the control room Clarke is noticeably calmer. She’s still angry, but she feels less like she might shatter. She can finally focus, and the mission is laid out in front of her, a clear goal that she needs to accomplish. She’ll worry about everything else after.

“Boy is it good to see you,” Bellamy says, smiling as he lets them into the control room. He gives Octavia a quick hug, but Clarke side steps his attempt to hug her too. She doesn’t think she can handle that right now. Holding herself together is hard enough without the sad look he’s giving her.

Jasper gives her a concerned look, but she ignores him too, going right to where Monty has his hands on the central computer panel. 

“Where are we with Tsing and Wallace?” she asks, looking at the lines of code flashing across the screen. It’s mesmerizing.

“I’ve deleted all the data I can find, but I can’t guarantee that there’s not a backup off site or hard copies somewhere,” Monty says without looking up. “Wallace and Tsing are with the rest of the civilians, barricaded in the bunker on the lower level.”

“Well, what are we waiting for?” Octavia asks, cracking her knuckles. “Let’s go get them.”

“That’s the bad news,” Monty says, “the bunker is completely self contained, and the doors can only be opened manually, from the inside.”

“So?” Octavia says, cocking her head. “I’ll just punch my way through it.”

“You can try, but I don’t think you’ll get anywhere,” Raven puts in. “It’s basically a smaller version of the exterior door.”

“Can you melt it?” Clarke asks Bellamy.

“Probably not,” he admits, looking unhappy.

“It’s coated in titanium carbide,” Raven explains. “Which is what they use to heat shield spacecraft, so unless you can get it above 5000 F it’s not going anywhere.”

“So we can’t get in.” Clarke sighs and pinches the bridge of her nose. She’s starting to feel like everything about this place is specifically designed to foil them. But then again, it probably had been. “Can we wait them out? We can’t get in, but they can’t get out without running into us either.”

“They have enough supplies to last for at least a year, so in theory yes, but we’d either have to camp out here or let the Canadian government take control,” Monty says. 

Neither of those are good options.

It occurs to her that even if they can get to them, without Lincoln they have no way to wipe Tsing’s mind. Which means that even if they can get to her their only option is to kill her. She wonders if the team will be strong enough to do it, of if she’s going to have to bear that burden herself. 

“I have an idea,” Bellamy says, pulling something out of his pocket and setting it on the console. “But I don’t think you’re going to like it.”

“What’s that?” Octavia asks, eyeing it suspiciously.

“It’s the transmitter they were using to suppress our powers,” Monty says, giving Bellamy a curious look. “I thought you destroyed it.”

“I thought it might come in handy.” Bellamy shrugs, not looking at Clarke. “In case the Grounders betrayed us.”

“Didn’t help,” Octavia mutters under her breath, not quite soft enough for Clarke not to hear.

Clarke ignores Octavia and picks up the transmitter, turning over in her hands. “How is it going to help us?”

“They were suppressing our powers by transmitting a signal that disrupts our abilities, right? Well I was thinking that if they can do that to us, why can’t we just do the same thing to them?” 

“I don’t think I follow, boss,” Jasper says, clearly confused. “They don’t have powers.”

Clarke realizes just what Bellamy is suggesting. It’s elegant, if horrible. A part of her is glad that he’s the one suggesting it and not her. “He’s not talking about taking away powers, Jasper. He’s suggesting we fry their brains.”

The room falls silent, as they all stare at the device in Clarke’s hand. It’s Clarke who finally speaks. “Can we do it, Raven?”

Raven hums under her breath and Clarke can hear her typing furiously. “I think so. Give me a --”

“I can’t believe you’re actually considering this,” Octavia interrupts angrily. “We can’t just murder those people.”

“What else are we supposed to do?” Bellamy replies. “Wait for Tsing to finish her experiments and start removing people’s powers against their will? It’s not like we haven’t done worse.”

“That doesn’t make it right!” Octavia argues. “We’re a lot of things, Bell, but we’re not murderers.”

“Get off your high horse, Octavia. Don’t pretend like you’ve never punched someone so hard they never woke up,” Bellamy says, raising his voice. 

Clarke sighs. She doesn’t have the energy for this right now. She knows what they have to do and infighting isn’t going to help. 

She turns to Octavia. “He’s right, O. We don’t have any other choice.”

“I thought you were better than that, Clarke,” Octavia spits, anger clear in her voice. “I thought you were a hero.”

Octavia turns and storms out of the room. Her words sting, but Clarke’s too numb to care. She has a job to do, Octavia or no. 

“Raven?” Clarke asks. “Can we do it?”

There’s a long pause, and when Raven finally speaks she sounds unsure. Clarke doesn’t blame her. “Yeah, we can. You just need to shift the frequency up by ten Hertz and max out the amplitude. You’ll need to only broadcast it in the bunker though, because at that power it should blow out anyone, powers or no.”

Clarke turns to Monty, handing him the transmitter. “Do it.”

“Are you sure?” he asks, looking between her and Bellamy. He takes the transmitter from Clarke, holding it like it might break. 

Clarke looks at Bellamy, and sees her own resolve reflected back at her. Bellamy puts his hand on Monty’s shoulder. “Do it.”

Monty gives them one last look before closing his eyes. After a couple of seconds he opens them again and hands the transmitter back to Clarke. “It’s done. All you need to do is plug it back in and it’ll activate.”

She and Bellamy don’t talk as he leads her down into the bowels of the facility to the server room, where the transmitter plugs in. 

She’s thankful for his unspoken support. She doesn’t think should could do what she’s about to do alone. Or at least, she glad she doesn’t have to bear the burden of it by herself. She knows that it’s their only option, really, but that doesn’t make her feel better about it. About killing people. 

The rest of the guards must have fled because they don’t encounter anyone on their way to the server room. The whole place feels abandoned, the only sound is the dull thud of their boots on concrete floor. 

When they turn the last corner they find Octavia, standing in front of the door, blocking their path. 

“I can’t let you do this,” Octavia says, fists clenched at her sides. 

“I don’t want to fight you, Octavia, but I will,” Clarke says. She hopes it doesn’t come to that, because that’s a fight she probably can’t win. 

Bellamy looks from Clarke to Octavia. He steps between them, giving Octavia a plaintive look. “Come on, O. Let us through.” 

She shakes her head, but doesn’t look away from Clarke. “This isn’t who we are. This isn’t who you are, Clarke.”

Clarke grits her teeth and lets out a frustrated breath. She doesn’t need this right now. “This isn’t about us. This is about all the people out there that Tsing and Wallace are going to hurt if we don’t put a stop to it.”

“There has to be another way. We’ll figure something out.” 

Clarke shakes her head. She can’t convince Octavia to do anything she doesn’t want to, especially when she digs her heels in like this. Normally it’s one of her favorite things about her friend, but right now she wishes she would stop being so willfully naive. 

“There isn’t. Not this time.”

“I’m sorry about this, Clarke,” Octavia says, adjusting her stance. 

By the time Octavia’s bringing her fist back, Clarke is already moving. She may not be as strong as Octavia, but she always was faster. 

She ducks under the punch and steps past Octavia, hooking her foot behind Octavia’s knee, throwing her off balance. She crashes into Bellamy, and before she can recover, Clarke is through the door. She locks it behind her, hoping that Bellamy will hold Octavia off for long enough for her finish this. 

She looks around at the banks of servers and realizes that she has no idea where the transmitter goes. Great.

“Raven,” she asks over the comm, “I need you to tell me where the transmitter goes.”

“Back corner, left side,” Raven says after a moment. 

“Alright, now what?” she asks once she’s located the correct server. 

“Pull out the drawer, yeah, now there should be a port that it plugs into on the right side. All you need to do is plug it in. It’ll activate on it’s own.”

Clarke pulls out the transmitter, hesitating. “This is the right thing to do, right?”

Raven pauses and the line goes quiet. “I really don’t know, Clarke. But...but I think it’s the only thing we can do.”

Clarke takes a breath. There’s a loud pounding on the door that can only mean that Octavia got past Bellamy and is on her way in. It’s now or never. 

***

Octavia finds her sitting on the floor, the transmitter beeping softly from the server port. 

“It’s done,” she says, looking up at her friend. Although she isn’t so sure they’re friends anymore. 

Octavia shakes her head, disgusted. She turns and leaves without saying a word. 

Bellamy finds her next. He pulls out the transmitter and hands it to her, sliding down the wall to sit next to her. 

She turns it over in her hands. “I really hope that was worth it.”

He gives her a long look. “You just saved the world, Clarke.”

“Why doesn’t it feel that way?”

She crushes the transmitter in her fist, wondering if things will ever be the same again.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm going to claim Comic Book Science for how this actually works, which to be fair, I think is more plausible than the actual show's "Your bodies metabolize radiation" thing which still makes me angry.
> 
> This chapter is once again unbeta'd (the rest of the story is probably not gonna be beta'd either so there's that) so any logical break downs and obvious mistakes are mine, and you can feel free to yell at me about them.


	9. Chapter 9

The inquiry into what is being called the Mount Weather Incident drags on for nearly three months. 

Kane shuts the team down pretty much as soon as they get back to the States, and they get recalled to DC while the investigation is ongoing. As much as Clarke hates DC, she’s glad to be out of New York. 

New York is Lexa’s city, and Clarke is happy to let her keep it. 

DC is boring, but that suits her just fine. She stays at her parent’s house, which feels big and empty and haunted by the childhood she left behind all those years ago. Even her mom hasn’t lived here in years. But Clarke is used to living with ghosts.

She can tell Bellamy and Raven are concerned about her. They text occasionally, checking up on her or trying to get her out of the house. She ignores them. They want her to talk about it, and she most definitely does not want to talk about it. 

Occasionally she’s called in to give interviews with the investigators or testify in front of Jaha and Sydney’s committee. Sometimes she sees her teammates there; she avoids them. Octavia ignores her. Raven and Bellamy give her concerned looks. Kane is disappointed. Even her own mom won’t make eye contact with her on the few occasions they see each other. It stings, but then again, she deserves it. 

The investigation drags on and she’s told the story so many times that the careful way she tells it starts to feel like the truth. She wishes it was the truth. Because then she never would have kissed Lexa. And maybe her betrayal wouldn’t feel quite so personal.

But she can’t escape it at night, when she’s back in the Mountain, or watching Lexa leave, or watching everyone she’s ever loved plunge to their deaths over that damn cliff, unable to stop them. Unable to save them.

The nights when she wakes up in a cold sweat, heart pounding, unsure where the dreams ends and her bedroom begins, Allie climbs into bed with her and nuzzles her neck and calms her down. She’s never been more thankful for her dumb dog who’s afraid of the cold and once let a rat chase her down the street. 

Christmas is a quiet and tense affair with her mom, who pretends like nothing has happened but isn’t very convincing about it. Clarke can’t blame her. She wouldn’t want to spend the holidays with her either. 

It’s the first week of February when Kane finally calls a meeting to discuss the investigation. The team gathers in a small conference room in the nondescript office building that serves as their DC headquarters. 

Kane stands at the front of the room and clears his throat, like he has hundreds of times before. It could almost be a normal briefing. But Octavia is seated as far from Clarke as possible, pointedly ignoring her, and Bellamy keeps looking at her as if she might break, and even Jasper and Monty are on edge. These briefings used to be not exactly fun, but an easy routine. This is nothing but a reminder of everything she’s lost. And all the pain she’s caused.

“The investigation has concluded and the committee has decided to not pursue any legal actions,” Kane says without preamble. There’s an nearly audible release of tension in the room. The threat of prison had hung heavy over them, because none of them particularly wanted to go back. “However, they have decided to end the program and disband the team.”

Suddenly everyone is talking over each other. 

“What?” Bellamy says in disbelief.

“End the program?” Raven asks, confused. 

“You can’t,” Octavia protests. 

“They can and they have,” Kane says once the hubbub dies down. “Your licenses will remain active, so you’re free to continue using your powers, but you will no longer be government employees. If you choose to continue being heroes you must work within the law.”

He looks directly at Clarke when he says that. She could almost laugh at the irony of it all, but instead she just looks away.

“That’s barely a deal,” Octavia grumbles. “Did you even try?”

Kane sighs and pinches the bridge of his nose. “This is the best I could get for you, guys. Sydney wanted to hand you over to the Canadians.”

“Some thanks for saving the world,” Bellamy says bitterly.

“Yeah well, not everyone sees it that way,” Kane says. “You’ll all be called in to debrief and go over the termination process within the next week. Please make yourselves available for that. We’re trying to keep this whole thing under wraps for now, but I suggest you lay low for a while.”

It’s a clear dismissal and they all get up to leave. No one tries to talk to Clarke on her way out. She’s thankful for that at least.

She’s finally free of Kane and the government and everything that’s held her back from being the hero she wants to be. So why doesn’t she feel like it?

***

Raven corners her after their debrief later that week, and basically forces her to get coffee. She doesn’t protest, because it feels like everything’s changing, and she doesn’t know when she’s going to see Raven again. 

“How are you doing?” Raven asks once they sit down, cutting right to the chase.

Clarke stares at her coffee, decidedly not wanting to have this conversation. But she probably owes Raven at least a semblance of an honest answer if nothing else. “I’ve been better.”

Raven gently nudges Clarke’s foot under the table. Clarke looks up to find Raven giving her a sympathetic look. “It wasn’t your fault, Clarke. You made the right call, given the circumstances.”

Clarke shakes her head and looks away. “I know.”

And she does. But that doesn’t make it any easier. 

“Octavia will come around. She just needs time,” Raven says, as if she’s trying to convince herself. Itt can’t be easy for Raven, being caught between her and Octavia.

“Well, we have lots of that now.” It comes out with more bitterness than she’d intended. 

Raven sighs, clearly not happy with Clarke’s non answers. But to her credit she doesn’t push. 

They sit in silence for a long time, at an awkward stalemate.

“Do you know what you’re going to do now?” Raven asks eventually.

The question catches Clarke off guard because she genuinely hasn’t thought about it. The future hasn’t seemed much worth considering lately.

“I don’t know...I don’t want to stay in DC, but I can’t go back to New York.” She shrugs, not really knowing what to say. “Maybe I’ll go to Boston or something, go to college. I don’t really have many employable skills.”

“You’re not gonna stay in the game? Go solo?” 

Clarke shakes her head. “I’m not sure America needs Skygirl anymore.”

Raven gives her a long look. “They may not need Skygirl, but they sure as hell need Clarke Griffin.”

“I don’t think I know who that is anymore.”

Raven finishes her coffee and stands up, her brace clicking into place. “Well you should probably figure it out. Because America needs more heroes like you.”

Clarke sits there nursing her coffee for a long time after Raven leaves. It occurs to her that for someone who had been called America’s Hero she’s never actually seen most of the country. 

By the time she leaves her coffee’s cold and she has a plan. And while she doesn’t exactly feel better, she does feel more together than she has in months, which is reason enough for hope. 

***

“Take care of yourself,” Bellamy says as he wraps her in a tight hug. 

She hugs him back, but makes no promises. 

Bellamy and Raven have come to see her off. 

While she appreciates their support, they’re making a bigger deal out it than she would like. Part of her had been tempted to pack up her dad’s old hatchback and leave without telling anyone, but the rational part of her knows that that would do more harm than good. So her friends are here, lingering at the edge of the driveway on a too cold day, acting like nothing has changed.

“You know how to reach us,” Raven says, looking up from where she’s petting Allie. “You know, if you need anything.”

And she does. Raven’s given her an emergency call button to use to contact her directly even if she doesn’t have cell service. She appreciates the gesture but she can’t imagine using it. She can see the way her friends are trying to take care of her rather than themselves, and she can’t stand being a burden. 

Clarke tears Allie away from Raven’s affection and herds her into the car. Allie isn’t happy about it, but she cheers up as soon as she’s installed in the front seat. 

Before she can get in the car herself, Raven steps between her and the open door, handing her a package. 

“What’s this?” 

“Your suit,” Raven says. “I stole it from Wells.”

Clarke’s stomach turns and she tries to push the package back into Raven’s hands. “No.”

Raven refuses to take it back. “Look, you don’t have to wear it, but you should have it. In case you change your mind.”

“I promise you I won’t. I’m not Skygirl anymore.”

“Then what harm can it do?”

Clarke hesitates. It feels too much like a reminder of all the things she’s failed to live up to. Of who she failed to be. 

Raven grabs the package back out of Clarke’s loose grip and tosses it into the back seat of the car. 

Clarke shakes her head, but makes no move to retrieve it. “Fine, but I’m not gonna use it.”

Raven looks satisfied and steps aside. Clarke gets in the car, but before she pulls the door shut she looks up at Raven. “You’re okay, right?”

Raven gives her a sad smile. “Don’t worry about me. I’ll be fine. I always am.”

“I’m sorry.”

“Don’t be.”

Clarke drives away. She doesn’t watch her friends disappear in the rearview mirror, because she’s tired of looking back. 

***

Clarke doesn’t really have a destination in mind, other than away. Her plan is to actually experience the country she’s spent so long defending, but she’s not sure what that means. 

So she just drives, following the signs to where ever seems interesting. She goes south first, trying to outrun the February chill. 

She’s free of all her obligations and responsibilities; it’s just her and her dog on the open road. It’s less romantic than it should be. But maybe that’s because her mind keeps wandering back to Lexa. 

She hasn’t really let herself think about Lexa since the Mountain. She’s afraid of what will happen if she opens that door, and it’s easier to just not feel anyways. 

But it’s getting harder to ignore it. To ignore the feelings that are sitting low in her chest. But now isn’t the time. So she keeps driving. 

She follows the signs to Savannah, where she stops. She spends a day walking Allie around the historical district, taking in the sights. She’s sitting on a bench in a square in the late afternoon when she sees a guy grab a woman’s purse and disappear into a side street. 

It’s so cliche she almost rolls her eyes, but she’s still herself and can’t just watch it happen and do nothing. 

“Stay,” she says to Allie as she gets up. Allie gives her a curious look but obeys as Clarke runs after the guy.

It only takes her two blocks to catch up to him and he’s so surprised he doesn’t put up much of a fight.

The woman thanks her profusely when she returns the purse. It makes Clarke feel better than she has in a long time. This is something she knows how to do. These small, uncomplicated acts. It’s why she agreed to become a hero in the first place. 

The woman gives Clarke a studying look. “You look familiar. Do I know you?”

Clarke smiles and shakes her head, trying to disguise her sudden unease. “No, I don’t think so.”

“Oh, I’ve got it. You’re that hero from New York. Stargirl. No, that’s not it...Skygirl. Yeah.” she says with a self satisfied look.

Clarke freezes. She shouldn’t be surprised because she’s been recognized before, never outside of New York, but she did just stop a purse snatcher. She panics and shakes her head with more force than is probably necessary. “No, not me. I’m no hero.”

It feels more like the truth than it has any right to.

“Are you sure?” the woman presses, “I never forget a face. And you did just chase down the guy who stole my purse.”

Clarke shrugs, trying to play it off as casually as she can. “I’m sure. I’m just your run of the mill good Samaritan. And I have one of those faces.”

The woman shakes her head, obviously not convinced, but she let's Clarke go without anymore questions.

Clarke doesn’t stick around Savannah after that.

She must be more shaken than she realized by being recognized, or maybe the events of the past couple of months are catching up to her, because she fights tears as she drives away from Savannah. 

It starts small, just frustration that she’s had to leave the only place she’s really felt at home, that her friends won’t talk to her, that she’s uncomfortable with the idea of being seen as a hero, which is the thing she gave up everything for. The thing that started all of this. 

But soon she has to pull over on a rural highway because she can’t control the tears. 

It’s the first time she’s let herself cry since this whole thing began and the enormity of everything that’s happened to her in the last six months soon overtakes her. 

But it’s not just that. Now that the door is open she can’t shut it off. 

It’s Finn and her dad and the childhood she never got to have. It’s the fact that everything it feels like she’s starting to have something good it’s torn away from her. And that the only person who has ever loved her unconditionally is her dog, who is trying to comfort her as sobs wrack her body. 

It’s the fact that she had cared for Lexa more than she had thought possible. And Lexa left her to die in the Canadian wilderness. 

She’s been made and unmade so many times that she’s not even sure who she is anymore. Who she could have been. She never had a choice and she never had a chance. Not really.

***

She wakes up in the back seat of her car, clutching her Skygirl suit to her chest, with Allie sprawled out on top of her. The sun’s starting to come up, illuminating the interior of the car in a golden glow.

She doesn’t feel better, exactly. The emptiness in her chest has been replaced by the dull ache of catharsis. 

Clarke wipes the crust from her eyes and resumes her drive, feeling less like she’s running away from her past and more like she’s headed towards something. She doesn’t know what though, or who she’ll be when she gets there.

***

She spends the spring slowly winding her way up the Mississippi River, stopping in whatever place catches her interest. A couple of days here, a week there, wandering through the heart of the country she’s given so much to. 

She finds herself helping in whatever way she can in the towns where she stops. It reminds her of who she is, and why she’s made the sacrifices she has. It makes her feel like she’s doing something real and tangible, even if it’s small.

She stays as long as a town will have her, or as long as she’s needed. 

She does her best to stay under the radar, dying her hair and only using the less flashy of her powers, and even then, sparingly. But she can see judgement in people’s eyes, and she can’t blame them, outsiders, and especially outsiders with powers, aren’t exactly popular in these parts, so she takes it as a sign to move on to the next place with space for a helpful stranger. 

In Arkansas she rescues a cat from a tree. Across the border in Tennessee she breaks up a meth ring. She helps sandbag against spring floods in Missouri and clears fallen trees after a storm in southern Illinois. 

She spends nearly three months in a town in Iowa, splitting her time between helping clean up after the spring floods and flirting with the girl who runs the register at the grocery store, a pretty blonde who kisses her behind the store on a sticky night in June.

Clarke feels guilty at first, like she’s betraying someone, but she pushes that thought aside and enjoys the moment. She’s not the one who did the betraying after all.

She stays there longer than she probably should. It feels good to have something uncomplicated and completely her own for once. Not burdened by her job or her past. But in the end someone in town finds out who she is, and the sheriff shows up at the room she’s renting and asks her leave.

He tells her he doesn’t want any trouble and she doesn’t want it any more than he does. So she leaves, a little sad at the abruptness, but it was never meant to last. Clarke doesn’t know where she belongs anymore, but it’s not small town Iowa. 

She turns west after that, watching summer turn into fall on the Great Plains. 

Winter is setting in by the time she reaches the Rockies. She spends the holidays in Colorado, volunteering with search and rescue teams pulling wayward skiers off the sides of mountains. No one asks too many questions about how you can find people stranded by avalanches and blizzards when you bring them home safe. 

She continues west once the worst of the winter passes, enjoying the warm weather of the desert after weeks in the cold and snow. 

Sometimes she wonders just how long she can do this. Running around the country in a self imposed exile, pretending that it’ll make things better. 

A year after she left DC finds Clarke in an old silver mining town in Nevada. She stares at her phone, considering calling someone. Raven or Bellamy, or even her mom, just to tell them she’s okay, to hear a friendly voice. In the end though, it’s more than she deserves. They’re better off without her anyways. 

The number she finds herself typing in is Lexa’s. She stares at it for a long time, hating herself for even considering it. She doesn’t even know if the number still works, or if it’s just another burner, discarded long ago. And what would she say? 

She doesn’t hit call. She never does. 

In late March she makes it to the Pacific Ocean. She stands on the beach, watching Allie chase seagulls, and wonders what she’s going to do now. She’s crossed the entire country, but she still doesn’t know where she fits. 

Helping people is the only thing she’s really good at, and the only thing she wants to do, but the thought of returning to New York and facing everything she’s left behind is as painful as it was when she left. 

Maybe she’ll stay here and make a go of going solo. California is fairly lenient about unlicensed heroes, and there’s a small community of them in San Francisco. 

She’s considering the merits of becoming a west coast hero when her phone rings. She stares at the name on the screen for a long time, a sinking feeling telling her it can’t be anything good. 

“Thank god, you picked up,” Octavia says when Clarke finally answers. “You need to come back to New York. We need your help. Lexa needs your help.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Oh yes I'm back! From outer space!
> 
> By outer space I mean boring things like grad school, and jury duty (fun fact, while the New York County Courthouse does have free wifi, they block ao3, smh New York Unified Court System). 
> 
> Anyways, we've finally reached the third act or so of this story. I'm not sure if there's going to be one or two more chapters, but it will be wrapping up soon. 
> 
> Also, disclaimer, my geographic knowledge of the Mississippi River only extends from the headwaters to the Minnesota/Iowa border, so there's that.


End file.
